 24 News, I'm Siobhan Raveev and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv. Today is Day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues. The IDF announced that 24-year-old Sergeant First Class and Reserves El Kanan Nulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the Central Gaza Strip. He was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas. A senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hossein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel, including a recent strike on an IDF base, was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday. Despite international efforts to prevent escalation, crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon. U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and addressed the humanitarian crisis in Gaza discussing the phase transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict. Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide. Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation. We know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians, who hides in and fires from schools, from hospitals, makes this incredibly challenging. But the daily toll on civilians in Gaza, particularly on children, is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza and as the IDF scales down its forces there. We agreed today on a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission. It will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north. Now this is not going to happen overnight, there are serious security, infrastructure and humanitarian challenges, but the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome. And joining us now from southern Israel is our I-24 news correspondent, Pierre Achlochendler. Pierre, what's the situation currently on the ground? Well, we know that the IDF is enlarging its ground offensive under the tutelage of the 98th Division of Combined Combat Forces in Ghaniunas in the central and southern sector of the city of Ghaniunas. We've heard some sporadic artillery fire toward the El Burej refugee camp. There's four refugee camps in the central sector of the Gaza Strip. Two of them are currently being invested by the Israeli army El Burej and Al-Murazid. There's another one El Nusserat, which is also one of the targets of the IDF mission in this area. And the situation behind us, which is south of Gaza City, is calm at this point. Now the U.S. is calling on Israel to allow the return of residents of Gaza to the north. What is the response? And is this feasible at this stage? You know, the soldier that was killed and whose death was announced overnight, belonged to the 98th Division of Combined Combat Teams and the task of that division and the task of that paramedic was to bisect to cut off the northern part of the Gaza Strip, which is under low-intensity warfare with the IDF cutting down the number of forces there from the central and southern sector where the ground offensive is in full force. Now this division is preventing the population that was displaced because of the fighting in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip and moved to the south of the Gaza Strip from returning north. And one of the problems of this displaced population is that there are still terror nests in the northern sector. Jebalia was targeted earlier this tonight. And even the U.S. Secretary of State says it's going to take time because there are unexploded ordnance in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip. There are still launching rockets on the communities around the Gaza Strip. And as a result, it's not going to happen immediately. And the Israeli Army says it's not going to happen now. Pierre Kloshandler, thank you very much. And joining us now is former head of the Israeli Security Agency, the Shin Bet Yaakov Peri. Thank you for joining us. Good morning. Good morning. Yaakov, we're hearing that this operation in Gaza is moving and shifting towards a third phase, but what does that mean exactly and does it make sense at this point to be shifting to a third phase, perhaps in the north, but certainly in the south there is so much more to do? Yeah, there is a lot of work to finalize. Mainly, in southern Egypt, we have a lot of tunnels, tunnels which we haven't found yet. And after we've found them, it's a big addition to eliminate them. We have almost two million refugees staying in the southern part of the Strip. And part of them will probably want to go back to the north. To all that issues, you have to add, of course, the issue of the hostages, which now we cannot say that we have any kind of solution. So it will take quite a time in order to finish the battles, bring back the hostages, and decide if to allow the refugees to go back to the north, and who will be the master of what's going on in Gaza in the future. Now there's talk of the return of the Gazans to northern Gaza, and the U.S. is certainly interested for this to happen. Will Israel allow this, and how can it even be achieved during war? Well, we have a couple of problems. First of all, up there in the northern part of the Strip, there is not many houses left. So people will not have places where to live. Of course, we didn't finalize some war issues, the northern part, and we are still the middle of the war in the southern part. So it will take time, and Israel will not allow Europe just to come back to the north. Now there are all kinds of – can hear all kinds of comments about the future. Some of the Israeli ministers are supporting kind of immigration, which is not a very good solution, but we have to check it with other countries. And of course, this is immigration, and without immigration, we will be left with almost two million citizens. Somebody will have to take care of them. Now with Israel withdrawing several brigades out of Gaza, and perhaps Gazans going back to the north, won't Hamas likely rebuild their network there? No doubt that Hamas will try. It depends how many – how successful it will be in our war, and how many Hamas operators will really eliminate. There is, of course, the danger that some of the followers will try to rebuild the organization. Now we know that U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has been in Israel and in the Middle East. What is the main message that he's delivering to Israel? First of all, for the time being, the U.S. is back covering us, and we have support and help, ammunition and, of course, sympathy and morale. But the U.S. is pushing us to a kind of ceasefire in order to finalize the problem of the hostages and to bring back refugees to the north. In that case, we have a lot of problems, because almost 70 percent of the buildings in the north are not existing anymore. So we have a big problem of housing, and the government of Israel, the Israeli cabinet, didn't decide yet who will take care of those who will remain together to take a lot of time. For the time being, there is no other – there is no other solution, and the army will have to stay there. Now let's talk about the northern border. Israel's northern border. We know that there have been targeted killings of Hezbollah operatives, and for the first time in quite a while, we're hearing Israel admit to the targeted killing. Usually we hear alleged reports, according to foreign media, and this time Israel is announcing that they did target and kill Hezbollah operatives. Why the change? Well, we are in another stage, in a higher stage in the north nowadays. Israel is not interested in breaking the whole war, and he didn't get – he is getting the orders from the Iranian and, of course, the Lebanese government, but he is targeting a Israeli northern settlements and army bases, and it's quite difficult to locate, destroy those little airplanes. And Israel has decided to go and to kill commanders in order to ease the war, the war, and the war. And for the time being, we killed – if I'm not mistaken – two, and we will kill more in order to chill a little bit the atmosphere in the north. Is this – do you believe that this is a good strategy, these targeted killings, Israel's responses? Is this a good strategy to up the military pressure, or should they target a more diplomatic approach? Well, we have to do both of the – we have to open the diplomatic way, and we have also to kill those who are targeting us. Only the combination of diplomatic initiatives and killing responsible commanders will give the – will bring a solution. I don't know how long it will take. Yakov Peli, thank you very much for joining us today. My pleasure. The U.S. military's central command says that U.S. and U.K. forces shot down 21 drones and missiles fired by Yemen-based Houthis into the southern Red Sea toward international shipping lanes, this following 26 Houthi attacks on commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea since November 19th. And joining us now in studio is our I-24 News Middle East correspondent, Ariel Osaran. We're hearing an attack on the Houthis. Where is this going? How is this going to be resolved, do you think? Yeah, this 26th attack by the Houthis really illustrates or amplifies the lack of action by the U.S.-led coalition against the Houthis that do not appear deterred even despite a statement by 14 countries, including the U.S., that the Houthis will bear responsibility for these attacks. We're talking about an attack last night off the coast of Yemen, 18 drones, two anti-ship cruise missiles, and an anti-ship ballistic missile. We're all launched. This is a complex attack according to Sencombe's statement, and they were all intercepted by American and British warships that are positioned in the area. The reason I mentioned this statement by 14 countries is because in Sencombe's statement regarding this attack, they also include a reference to that statement at the end of it, which it's hard not to read it as passive aggression towards American political leaders. This is the U.S. Central Command saying that on January 3rd, 14 countries, including the U.S., issued a joint statement stating the Houthis will bear responsibility for the consequences. Should they continue to threaten lives of the global economy with a free flow of commerce in the region's critical waterways, so far we have not seen any proactive steps taken by this U.S. coalition to stop these attacks besides diplomatic steps. Later today, the U.N. Security Council is expected to hold a vote that will condemn these Houthi attacks, but given that this follows just other statements that are not only condemning the attacks, but warning of their continuation, it is not clear whether this additional statement will have any implications as to the security reality in the waters of the Red Sea, so far they have not done that. And we know that this is certainly impacting maritime trade, a Chinese shipping giant Costco stopped visiting Israeli ports, and there are other implications in the region, so this is quite a serious issue and is escalating as we speak. Indeed, for, I mean, this is an attempt, and so far partially successful, by the Houthis, obviously the proxy of Iran, to try and impose a maritime blockade on Israel, and it's effective, it's working, and it's not just on Israel and its ports, but it's on a geographical area that is a key waterway for the global economy. About 12 to 15 percent of all global commerce runs through there, through the Red Sea, and then into the Suez Canal, basically connecting the shipping routes of Asia and Europe. And so this is a significant threat, not just for Israel, and not just for the region. This is really a global threat. We are seeing countries all around the world joining forces to try and stop this. So far these attempts are not going beyond anything militarily beyond thwarting attacks. I will just note that the other day, newly appointed foreign minister in Israel, Issa Al-Khat, saying that Israel does not need America at all, that America is not helping Israel at all, that is not the case. America is helping militarily with thwarting attacks, whether this was aimed towards Israel or not, probably not, but the U.S. has thwarted these drone strikes and missiles aimed at Israel. And so putting this all together, military presence important, but so far it's not done enough to stop these attacks. Ariel Osiram, thank you very much. And now we shift to some disturbing new footage from the 7th of October. The atrocities that unfolded on that Saturday in southern Israel caught on tape by Hamas terrorists themselves using body camp footage taken by their elite Nukba forces. These images may be difficult to watch. More in this report from Channel 12 News. Early morning, October 7th, Hamas' Nukba force still in their lairs turn on the cameras that will record their attack and the massacre to follow. Along with tea and trail mix, the terrorist on the left lays out this bag. That looks like drugs to me. Captain gone. Speed drugs. See? This is the symbol of the Muslim Brotherhood. Allah Wahid, one God. Islamist tax. Now the terrorists face the Israeli obstacle. Four layers of fences, barbed wire, the old fence, earthmounds, and the $3 billion smart fence. After the second blast, they make their way through the old fence and proceed to the smart fence. The terrorists have now invaded Israel. A stopwatch counting from the first explosion until the moment terrorist squad number one crosses into Israel shows seven and a half minutes. And that time, they meet no Israeli resistance. It's very well timed based on extensive exercises. There's a surprise factor here and their numbers. Their numbers is what tip the scales in the crucial first minutes. On a different route in the Gaza envelope, Nukh Basquad number three ambushes civilian cars. The radio is on. An ecstatic song is calling, bomb, burn. Leave no Zionist alive. It seems you're even more upset when you see the terrorists. Because I see the vacuum. I say this with humility. We could have had hundreds waiting for them at the border. Most often, they knew exactly where to go. And when on site, they knew which places. Here the terrorists come into view of Kibbut Sufa. They also encounter fire from the adjacent military base, which stalls them. Having crossed the orchard, they are within reach of the army stronghold. What we're hearing is only AK-47 fire. You can tell that there's no IDF fire at this time. The fight at the main gate of the base lasted several hours, thanks to the resistance of Israel's Nakhal forces. This terrorist seems in charge of the attack on the base. He gives the orders, although no one calls him by rank. You see a commander sending his men forward. You won't see that in the IDF. The supposed commander catches up. The terrorists enter the barracks. There's almost no one there. Most soldiers in the base are fighting in the mess hall. Many of them are wounded, some seriously. Here, a terrorist films himself in the mirror, fussing around documentation and the apparent orders from commanders inside Gaza for propaganda footage keep stirring quarrels. This is the Hamas' military radio. Simple walkie-talkies with few miles range. They've used them for years. According to reports, especially in the foreign media, 8200 IDF signal intelligence unit stopped listening to those radios, which are probably the ones Hamas used in their exercise. Despite their injuries and lack of ammunition, those IDF soldiers still alive managed to hold back the terrorists. After hours of Hamas controlling the base, Shayet at Navy commandos arrive and clear the base from terrorists. Meanwhile, in nearby Kibbutzoufa, terrorist squad number four manages to enter. They struggle to open the gate, but they eventually succeed. In the attempt to hold the terrorists, Kibbutz security team member Oz Khubara is killed. On their killing spree, these two will kill two civilians, Bernard Cohen and Ofir Arez. Then, finally, they are eliminated. That's all for this edition of I-24 News. We have rolling coverage, providing you with the latest from Israel. We'll be back at the top of the hour. For more news and updates, be sure to follow us on our website i-24news.tv and across our social media platforms. I'm Seba Raveave. Thank you for watching. Luther King's famous 1968 mountaintop speech was based on his trip to the Promised Land. Well now, 55 years later, his prophetic words are coming true. Stories of African American women took a journey of a lifetime to the Holy Land. We'll introduce you to the amazing female spiritual and religious leaders who are infusing new energy into the next generation of African Americans. 24 News, I'm Seba Raveave and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv. Today is day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues. The IDF announced that 24-year-old Sergeant First Class and Reserves El Kanan Nulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the central Gaza Strip. He was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas. A senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hossein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel including a recent strike on an IDF base was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday. Despite international efforts to prevent escalation, crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and addressed the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, discussing the phase transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict. Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide. Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation. We know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians who hides in and fires from schools, from hospitals makes this incredibly challenging. But the daily toll on civilians in Gaza, particularly on children, is far too high. As Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza and as the IDF scales down its forces there, we agreed to down a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission. It will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north. Now, this is not going to happen overnight. There are serious security, infrastructure and humanitarian challenges, but the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome. And joining us now from southern Israel is our I-24 news correspondent, Pierre Kloeschendler. Pierre, what's the situation currently on the ground? Well we know that the IDF is enlarging its ground offensive under the tutelage of the 98th Division of Combined Combat Forces in Hanyunas in the central and southern sector of the city of Hanyunas. We've heard some sporadic artillery fire toward the El Buraj refugee camp. There's four refugee camps in the central sector of the Gaza Strip. Two of them are currently being invested by the Israeli Army El Buraj and Al-Mughazi. There's another one, El Nusserat, which is also one of the targets of the IDF mission in this area. And the situation behind us, which is south of Gaza City, is calm at this point. Now the U.S. is calling on Israel to allow the return of residents of Gaza to the north. What is the response and is this feasible at this stage? You know the soldier that was killed and whose death was announced overnight belonged to the 98th Division of Combined Combat Teams and the task of that division and the task of that paramedic was to bisect, to cut off the northern part of the Gaza Strip, which is under low intensity warfare with the IDF cutting down the number of forces there from the central and southern sector where the ground offensive is in full force. Now this division is preventing the population that was displaced because of the fighting in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip and moved to the south of the Gaza Strip from returning north. And one of the problems of this displaced population is that there are still terror nests in the northern sector. Jebalia was targeted earlier this tonight and even the U.S. Secretary of State says it's going to take time because there are unexploded ordnance in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip. There are still launching rockets on the communities around the Gaza Strip and as a result it's not going to happen immediately. And the Israeli Army says it's not going to happen now. Pierre Klosschandler, thank you very much. And joining us now is former head of the Israeli Security Agency, the Shin Bet Yaakov Perry. Thank you for joining us. Good morning. Good morning. Yaakov, we're hearing that this operation in Gaza is moving and shifting towards a third phase. But what does that mean exactly and does it make sense at this point to be shifting to a third phase perhaps in the north but certainly in the south there is so much more to do? Yeah, there is a lot of work to finalize. Mainly in southern Egypt we have a lot of tunnels, tunnels which we haven't found yet. And after we've found them it's a big addition to eliminate them. We have almost two million refugees staying in the southern part of the Strip. And part of them will probably want to go back to the north. To all that issues you have to add, of course, the issue of the hostages, which now we cannot say that we have any kind of solution. So it will take quite a time in order to finish the battles, bring back the hostages and decide if to allow the refugees to go back to the north and who will be the master of what's going to go in Gaza in the future. Now there's talk of the return of the Gazans to northern Gaza and the U.S. is certainly interested for this to happen. Will Israel allow this and how can it even be achieved during war? Well, we have a couple of problems. First of all, up there in the northern part of the Strip there is not any houses left. So people will not have places where to live. Of course, it didn't finalize some war issues, the northern part, and we are still in the middle of the war in the southern part. So it will take time and Israel will not allow the refugees to come back to the north. Now there are all kinds of – can hear all kinds of comments about the future. Some of the Israeli ministers are supporting kind of immigration, which is not a very good solution, but we have to check it with other countries. And of course, with immigration, without immigration, we will be left with almost 2 million citizens. Somebody will have to take care of them. Now with Israel withdrawing several brigades out of Gaza and perhaps Gazans going back to the north, won't Hamas likely rebuild their network there? No doubt that Hamas will try. I don't know how many – how successful it will be in our war and how many Hamas operators will really eliminate. There is of course the danger that some of the followers will try to rebuild the organization. Now we know that U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has been in Israel and in the Middle East. What is the main message that he's delivering to Israel? First of all, for the time being, the U.S. is back covering us, and we have support and help, ammunition and of course sympathy and morale. But the U.S. is pushing us to a kind of ceasefire in order to finalize the program of the hostages and to bring back refugees to the north. In that case, we have a lot of problems because almost 70 percent of the buildings in the north are not existing anymore. So we have a big problem of housing and the government of Israel, the Israeli cabinet, didn't decide yet who will take care of those who will remain Gaza to take a lot of time. For the time being, there is no other solution and the army will have to stay there. Now let's talk about the northern border. Israel's northern border. We know that there have been targeted killings of Hezbollah operatives. And for the first time in quite a while, we're hearing Israel admit to the targeted killing. Usually, we hear alleged reports according to foreign media. This time Israel is announcing that they did target and kill Hezbollah operatives. Why the change? Well, we are in another stage, in a higher stage in the north nowadays. Israel is not interested in breaking the whole war. And he didn't get the, he's getting the orders from the Iranian and, of course, the Lebanese government. But he's targeting a Israeli modern settlements and army bases. And it's quite difficult to locate, destroy those little airplanes. And Israel has decided to go and to kill commanders in order to ease the war, the war and the war. And for the time being, we killed, if I'm not mistaken, two. And we will kill more in order to chill a little bit the atmosphere in the north. Is this, do you believe that this is a good strategy, these targeted killings, Israel's responses? Is this a good strategy to up the military pressure or should they target a more diplomatic approach? Well, we have to do both of the, we have to open the diplomatic way and we have also to kill those who are targeting us. And the combination of diplomatic initiates and killing the responsible commanders will give the, will bring a solution. I don't know how we're going to take it. Yakov Peli, thank you very much for joining us today. My pleasure. The US military central command says that US and UK forces shot down 21 drones and missiles fired by Yemen-based Houthis into the southern Red Sea toward international shipping lanes. This following 26 Houthi attacks on commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea since November 19th. And joining us now in studio is our I-24 News Middle East correspondent, Ariel Osiram. We're hearing an attack on the Houthis. Where is this going? How is this going to be resolved, do you think? Yeah, this 26th attack by the Houthis really illustrates or amplifies the lack of action by the US-led coalition against the Houthis that do not appear deterred even despite a statement by 14 countries, including the US, that the Houthis will bear responsibility for these attacks. We're talking about an attack last night off the coast of Yemen, 18 drones, two anti-ship cruise missiles, and an anti-ship ballistic missile, where all launched this complex attack according to Sankam's statement. And they were all intercepted by American and British warships that are positioned in the area. Now, the reason I mention this statement by 14 countries is because in Sankam's statement regarding this attack, they also include a reference to that statement at the end of it, which it's hard not to read it as passive aggression towards American political leaders. This is the US Central Command saying that on January 3rd, 14 countries, including the US, issued a joint statement stating the Houthis will bear the responsibility for the consequences. Should they continue to threaten lives of the global economy with a free flow of commerce in the region's critical waterways, so far we have not seen any proactive steps taken by this US coalition to stop these attacks besides diplomatic steps. Later today, the UN Security Council is expected to hold a vote that will condemn these Houthi attacks, but given that this follows just other statements that are not only condemning the attacks but warning of their continuation, it is not clear whether this additional statement will have any implications as to the security reality in the waters of the Red Sea, so far they have not done that. And we know that this is certainly impacting maritime trade, a Chinese shipping giant Costco stopped visiting Israeli ports and there are other implications in the region, so this is quite a serious issue and is escalating as we speak. Indeed, for I mean this is an attempt and so far partially successful by the Houthis, obviously the proxy of Iran, to try and impose a maritime blockade on Israel and it's effective, it's working and it's not just on Israel and its ports, but it's on a geographical area that is a key waterway for the global economy. About 12 to 15 percent of all global commerce runs through there, through the Red Sea and then into the Suez Canal basically connecting the shipping routes of Asia and Europe and so this is a significant threat not just for Israel and not just for the region, this is really a global threat. We are seeing countries all around the world joining forces to try and stop this, so far these attempts are not going beyond anything militarily beyond thwarting attacks. I will just note that the other day newly appointed foreign minister in Israel Issa Al-Khat saying that Israel does not need America at all, that America is not helping Israel at all, that is not the case. America is helping militarily with thwarting attacks, whether this was aimed towards Israel or not, probably not, but the U.S. has thwarted these drone strikes and missiles aimed at Israel and so putting this all together, military presence important, but so far it's not done enough to stop these attacks. Ariel Osaran, thank you very much. And now we shift to some disturbing new footage from the 7th of October. The atrocities that unfolded on that Saturday in southern Israel caught on tape by Hamas terrorists themselves using body camp footage taken by their elite Nukba forces. These images may be difficult to watch, more in this report from Channel 12 News. Early morning, October 7th, Hamas's Nukba force still in their lairs turn on the cameras that will record their attack and the massacre to follow. Along with tea and trail mix, the terrorist on the left lays out this bag. That looks like drugs to me. Captain Ghan. Speed drugs. See? This is the symbol of the Muslim Brotherhood. Allah Wahid, one God. Islamist texts. Now the terrorists face the Israeli obstacle. Four layers of fences, barbed wire, the old fence, earth mounds and the $3 billion smart fence. After the second blast, they make their way through the old fence and proceed to the smart fence. The terrorists have now invaded Israel. A stopwatch counting from the first explosion until the moment terrorist squad number one crosses into Israel shows seven and a half minutes. In that time, they meet no Israeli resistance. It's very well timed based on extensive exercises. There is a surprise factor here and their numbers. Their numbers is what tip the scales in the crucial first minutes. On a different route in the Gaza envelope, Nour Basquad number three ambushes civilian cars. The radio is on. An ecstatic song is calling bomb, burn. Leave no Zionist alive. It seems you're even more upset when you see the terrorists. Because I see the vacuum. I say this with humility. We could have had hundreds waiting for them at the border. Most often, they knew exactly where to go. And when on site, they knew which places. Here, the terrorists come into view of Kibbutz Sufa. They also encounter fire from the adjacent military base, which stalls them. Having crossed the orchard, they are within reach of the Army stronghold. What we're hearing is only AK-47 fire. You can tell that there's no IDF fire at this time. The outer fence of the base is breached. Fifteen minutes. That's how long it took this squad from the moment they crossed the fence till they charged the Sufa military base. The fight at the main gate of the base lasted several hours, thanks to the resistance of Israel's Nakhal forces. This terrorist seems in charge of the attack on the base. He gives the orders, although no one calls him by rank. You see a commander sending his men forward. You won't see that in the IDF. The supposed commander catches up. The terrorists enter the barracks. There's almost no one there. Most soldiers in the base are fighting in the mess hall. Many of them are wounded, some seriously. Here, a terrorist films himself in the mirror. Fussing around documentation and the apparent orders from commanders inside Gaza for propaganda footage keep stirring quarrels. This is the Hamas' military radio. Simple walkie-talkies with few miles range. They've used them for years. According to reports, especially in the foreign media, 8,200 IDF signal intelligence units stopped listening to those radios, which are probably the ones Hamas used in their exercise. Despite their injuries and lack of ammunition, those IDF soldiers still alive managed to hold back the terrorists. Help! What are you doing? Help! Help! After hours of Hamas controlling the base, Shayetat Navy commandos arrive and clear the base from terrorists. Meanwhile, in nearby Kibbutzoufa, terrorist squad number four manages to enter. They struggle to open the gate, but they eventually succeed. We're going to break it! In the attempt to hold the terrorists, Kibbutz security team member Oz Khubara is killed. On their killing spree, these two will kill two civilians, Bernard Cohen and Ofir Erez. Then, finally, they are eliminated. I should have laid in the laundry room. That's all for this edition of I-24 News. We have rolling coverage, providing you with the latest from Israel. We'll be back at the top of the hour. For more news and updates, be sure to follow us on our website, i-24news.tv and across our social media platforms. I'm Seba Raveve. Thank you for watching. State of war families completely gunned down in their beds. We have no idea where we see as our soldiers are fighting on the front line, but the general perception is something that certainly needs to be fought as well. I'm Seba Raveve and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv. Today is day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues. The IDF announced the 24-year-old sergeant first class in reserves El Kanan Nulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the central Gaza Strip. He was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas. A senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hossein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel, including a recent strike on an IDF base, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon yesterday. Despite international efforts to prevent escalation, crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon. U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and addressed the humanitarian crisis in Gaza discussing the phase transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict. Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide. Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation. Take a listen. We know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians who hides in and fires from schools, from hospitals, makes this incredibly challenging. But the daily toll on civilians in Gaza, particularly on children, is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza. And as the IDF scales down its forces there, we agreed to down a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission. It will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north. Now, this is not going to happen overnight. There are serious security, infrastructure, and humanitarian challenges. But the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome. And joining us now in studio is head of research at the IDSF Habitronistim, Ory Sachar, and senior journalist at Idiot Akronot, Daley Bendro Yamini. Thank you both for coming in. Bendro, I'd like to speak to you about the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken's visit to Israel as part of a broader Middle East regional trip. What was his message coming here to Israel? His message, actually, is what he wants to achieve at the end is a kind of a ceasefire. Why? Because, yes, the majority in the American public is still supporting Israel. But he hears the people who are totally against. And we saw what happened in one of the conferences of President Biden when people were shouting from the audience. So he does understand that maybe, just maybe, they have a problem. I'm not sure that the way that they behave is the right way, because the point is that you do not have to put the pressure on Israel. You have to put the pressure on the leaders of the Hamas. They are the people who refused again and again to any kind of disarming the Gaza Strip and other proposals that actually were initiated from the international community, speaking about the EU, speaking about the Quartet. And unfortunately, and I have to criticize my own government, they do not use it. They do not use it. They can initiate something like that. You know what? We know the answer. If Israel will suggest ceasefire for disarming the Gaza Strip, we know that they are going to say yes. But speaking about the international arena, Israel can only benefit from such an initiative. But Israel is not doing anything. And the outcome is that we have this kind of international pressure, as we saw yesterday from Anthony Blinken, unfortunately. So we're seeing international pressure and certainly American pressure. Israel should initiate, because it should be that headlines in the international media will be not that Hamas is asking for a ceasefire. It should be the opposite. Israel is asking for a ceasefire, yes, for disarming the Gaza Strip. Let them say no. Don't take them no upon yourself. And that, unfortunately, what Israel is doing. And you believe a ceasefire, calling out for a ceasefire on Israel's behalf is the right move at this point, when not all of the war's objectives were not yet fulfilled. What I'm talking about, we have a problem in the international public opinion. What I'm suggesting will help Israel in that respect. I'm not saying that they are going to accept it. We both know that they are not going to accept it. So it's a win-win situation. If they will say yes, great. We don't have to shoot anymore. And the international power, whoever will come in order to dismantle the Gaza Strip. They're saying yes to what, exactly? If they will say yes to what? To releasing the hostages? To disarming? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Both, of course, Israel will put the preconditions, hostages disarming the Gaza Strip, removing all the Hamas leadership, not even killing them. I don't care about them. Why not to initiate something? Why always, but always, to be pushed by the United States? Why always to be pushed by the international community? We have to initiate something. And we do not do it, unfortunately. But has Israel not said time and again that these are the objectives of the war? Demilitarizing, releasing the hostages? Of course we have to dismantle the Hamas. I mean, I'm supporting all the goals of this operation. But we are losing power in the international community, in the public opinion. We are losing power. And eventually, it happened already three times before that we were doing very well on the ground. And we had to stop it in Lebanon, second in the two big operations in Gaza Strip. We had to stop. We were forced, actually, to stop. Do we want it again? And that's what we might face in the next upcoming weeks. Bendro and Orr, please stay with us. We'll be back to you in a moment. But in the meantime, joining us from southern Israel is our I-24 news correspondent, Pierre Klochendler. Pierre, what's the situation on the ground? The IDF just announced that the operation, the ground offensive, in the central sector, which started more or less on December 23. And in Hanyunas, southward, which started in December 2, are going in full force and even deepening, especially in Hanyunas. The IDF announces that there were 150 strikes on presumed terror targets in the refugee camp on El Mourazi, which is in the central sector of the Gaza Strip and which has been invaded by the Israeli army, as well as El Borej, another refugee camp. You may have heard now the outgoing of artillery fire, which is in this direction, in the direction of Jucho Redik, which is at the entrance of the four refugee camps of the central sector of the Gaza Strip. We know that scores of terrorists have been killed during those strikes, which are supporting the ground forces operating in the area. And the US has been calling on Israel to allow the return of residents of Gaza to the northern area of the Gaza Strip. What's the response at this point? Well, the response is that the Israeli government has accepted that the UN Special Envoy for the Gaza Strip will be visiting the northern sector of the Gaza Strip at some point. There's no definite date. But there are absolutely no definite date for the return of displaced Palestinians. There are about a million who moved from the battleground in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip when the ground offensive started on October 27. Now the war in the northern Gaza Strip is a low-intensity warfare. That means cleaning the area of unexploded ordinance minds that have been stirring the northern sector of the Gaza Strip, as well as cleansing the towns that are facing the communities in Israel, eradicating those towns because of anti-tank guided missile, because of sniper fire before the war, and as a result, the Israeli army's creating some sort of perimeter, security perimeter, in which the population will not be able to leave because it's a field of ruins. So at this moment, there is absolutely no schedule for the return of the million people that were displaced from the north to the south. Pierre Kluchender, thank you very much. And back in studio with us are Bandro Yamini and Ory Sachal. We are hearing our correspondent, Pierre, down south by the border with Gaza. And we're hearing him speak of a low-intensity warfare in the southern part. What does that mean exactly? I think Israel should practice what it preaches. I mean, you cannot, on the one hand, define an objective of the war, which is defeating Hamas and annihilating all of its political-military infrastructure and bringing back all the hostages, and only then move to stage three, which is purifying so-called clearing the area from terrorists for a year or two, three to come, like we did after the defensive shield operation in Judensim area. And right now, we are hearing double voices. And that starts to concern, to be honest. We see how the visit of a Secretary of State Blinken representing precisely the attitude of October 6. We cannot go back to the days before the October 7 attack, where we chant the same rhythm and the same hymn of two-state solution, of humanitarian corridors, of bringing people back to their homes of independent Palestinian state. We need to think and echo a whole different attitude, because we see the mounting international pressure come within Israeli initiative to the day after in Gaza, start enacting it in the ground. If we have sufficient control over the northern Gaza Strip, we should continue and start planning the military, the martial law that will be there for a couple of months before the final stage as we envision the Gaza Strip. Residents should not go back to northern Gaza. IDF troops are still fighting there, and the mission is far from over, far from over. And I'm struggling to understand why the Israeli, both administration and public officials, do not come with clear vision for the Gaza Strip to conquer the entire Gaza Strip, to clear the entire Gaza Strip from terrorists. And even if the United States pressures us to go for the two state solution, at the end of the day, that represent precisely what Blinken said, we are aware of the problems, we're aware of the issues, but we don't have a better solution. So if they don't have better solutions, let's bring our own solutions. And there is so much more to develop and speak about this, but I do want to discuss with you a new report that came out by Ashok al-Ausat, saying basically that the October 7th massacre was planned out a decade ago, before the 2014 operation, and was kept top secret. Only five top Hamas operatives knew the exact details, and I quote what they say here. Only five people, the leader of the Hamas movement in the Gaza Strip, Yehiss Sunwar, the leader of the Al-Qasam Brigades, Mohamed Adif, and one of his most important aides and the most wanted by Israel, Mohamed Al-Sunwar, which is Yehiss' brother, and the leader of the movement, Rahoui Mushtaha, who is close to Sunwar, along with Aiman Nofal, one of DEF's close associates, and the former official in charge of Al-Qasam Intelligence. So we see that they were able to keep this top secret for a very long time. We also saw, by the way, that the Hamas leadership in Gaza made a pretty much independent decision, not even informing most of the Hamas leadership abroad, not to mention the Iranians, et cetera. Look, these kind of reports keep coming, and my suggestion is that many more will come, but at the end of the day, yes. Israel was aware that Hamas has such plans simply because it televised them all around social media and all around the Hamas state media, inviting reporters to witness maneuvers and drills that it conducted to abduct Israelis to take over townships, to take over military bases. Hezbollah does the same thing last summer. He did exactly the same thing, inviting media to document Hezbollah troops taking over the Galilee. And I don't think that anyone was surprised by the very intention. I think the surprise by the defense apparatus was the sheer scale of it and the sheer scope and- The execution. Exactly, the execution, and quite literally the execution. And unfortunately, we saw the scale of brutality and the level of response by Israel, which was insufficient to say the least. That will have to be investigated later, but we do know that, to be honest, there's a difference between, let's say, knowledge and internalization. We did not internalize Hamas's intentions. We kind of derogated our enemies by not believing that they will actually be capable of doing all these things. They would, they're only touting their media outlets in order to gain some domestic support. And this kind of derogation and not estimating your enemy as much as we should has been characteristic, had been characteristic of the October 6th paradigm. This is not something we can go back to. And I think at the end of the day, we should apply the same logic elsewhere. What are Hezbollah's true intentions? What are the Arabs, the Palestinians, the Densimers' true intentions? What are Iran's true intentions striving to a nuclear bomb? All these things should be very carefully considered. And we hear in the same report, Palestinian sources say that the flood, which is what they call the massacre that they executed, like you say, this flood began with only 70 fighters, Hamas fighters, who carried out the surprise attack. They were trained. They were selected from hundreds of operatives. They were trained all the way until this very moment when they carried out these specific attacks. Absolutely. And they keep training. And I think they kind of sort of neutralize the awareness on the part of Israeli systems by keeping on drilling and keeping on maneuvering. And not doing the real-time attack until it actually happened. So we kind of assume that there were still drills and still maneuvers, et cetera. But I think that really what the reporter just mentioned said that only 70 people were trained for that. And we saw how 3,000 Gazans invaded, of which we assume hundreds, if not thousands, of Nukhba fighters. But hundreds, if not thousands of other Gazans, who were the Zara'in, as they say, the masses, who invaded after the Hamas attack, the aftermath, kept murdering and stealing and committing all sorts of atrocious crimes. At the end of the day, I think Hamas maybe was even surprised by its own success. It definitely envisioned how its own elite units will react. But encouraging the masses to go out was something it planned, like it did in the riots on the fence. But had they expected it would do such a phenomenal success, as much as it's sad to say it, I think they expected even much more. They expected to penetrate deep into Jenin's Samaria, reach the heart of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. And in that sense, the bravery of the police, of the border police, of the IDF, showed that it was definitely Israel that met them on the other side of the fence, although it would have to be investigated at the later stage. Oh, thankfully, that didn't happen. Because there are two conceptions, two attitudes. One is saying, when they declare something like, we want to exterminate all the Jews, we want to exterminate all the Christians, they say it, by the way, in the TV channel. They say it. And for example, I mean, we don't have to go 10 years back, which is very interesting. But Yakhir Sinwa just declared exactly what they are going to do in 2018. Now, what was the conception? If they say it, they do not mean it. And which is a big mistake? Because when they say it, they mean it. They are going to carry it out. And that's what so many people in Israel, and I'm speaking about the army, and I'm speaking about the government, they did not want to believe that they mean every word that they said. I do remember sitting with an Iranian professor some years ago. And he told me, look, whatever the leaders of Iran are saying, they mean it. We forgot that. They absolutely mean it. And they were underestimated. Ben-Roy Amini and Ori Sakhal, thank you very much for joining us. Thank you so much. The US military central command says that US and UK forces shot down 21 drones and missiles fired by Yemen-based Houthis into the southern Red Sea toward international shipping lanes. This following 26 Houthi attacks on commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea since November 19. Earlier today, I spoke to I-24 News Middle East correspondent Ariel Oceran. Take a listen. This 26th attack by the Houthis really illustrates amplifies the lack of action by the US-led coalition against the Houthis that do not appear deterred even despite a statement by 14 countries, including the US, that the Houthis will bear responsibility for these attacks. We're talking about an attack last night off the coast of Yemen, 18 drones, two anti-ship cruise missiles, and an anti-ship ballistic missile. We're all launched as a complex attack according to St. Com's statement. And they were all intercepted by American and British warships that are positioned in the area. Now, the reason I mention this statement by 14 countries is because in St. Com's announcement or statement regarding this attack, they also include a reference to that statement at the end of it, which it's hard not to read it as passive aggression towards American political leaders. This is the US Central Command saying that on January 3, 14 countries, including the US, issued a joint statement stating that Houthis will bear the responsibility for the consequences. Should they continue to threaten lives of the global economy or the free flow of commerce in the region's critical water race, so far we have not seen any proactive steps taken by this UN coalition to stop these attacks besides diplomatic steps. Later today, the UN Security Council is expected to hold a vote that will condemn these Houthi attacks. But given that this follows just other statements that are not only condemning the attacks but warning of their continuation, it is not clear whether this additional statement will have any implications as to the security reality in the waters of the Red Sea. So far, they have not done that. Most communities from the Gaza envelope left their homes three months ago. Now the community of Enhabesor is facing a new challenge as some people return home and others refuse to. Our correspondents, Uri Shapira and Karmit Molcho, have more in this report. A small group gathered last week to discuss the future plans for the village. These include a new basketball court and a communal garden. Nothing exceptional, perhaps, except the village in question, is Enhabesor, adjacent to the Gaza Strip. We're going to be here now today. You hear the bombing behind us. It's probably the most safe place in Israel right now. Okay? There's hundreds of thousands of soldiers a few miles away. And it's going to be safe. Because if this place is not going to be safe in a few months or a year from now, no place in Israel is going to be safe. This is the task of the country of our generation. It's our shift to make it better, safer and stronger than what it was. Most of Enhabesor's residents were evacuated to a lot in other locations after the murderous Hamas assault of October 7th. Village resident Professor Iftah Geffner supports this quick return and the recovery of this community. That's not everyone agrees with him. Each person can do whatever he wants. But as a community, I think that the government position should be to wait for a second. We will find an answer to all of your needs. Now we have the opportunity to solve the issue and you'll come back once the place is safe. For many in this community, Enhabesor is stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, it is close to the Gaza border and there are constant threats in the area. But as opposed to other places like near Oz and Kibbutz Bayeri, Enhabesor managed to block the Hamas infiltration on October 7th, mostly thanks to the security squad and some say luck. And as some communities moved to permanent residency in cities like Tel Aviv, others like Enhabesor are still staying in hotels. We came here because we didn't have a choice. We moved to Elad. It is three hours away from here. My husband was called up to the IDF. If he was a few hours away, he could have driven to Elad just to see us. The distance in the time without him is very difficult for me and for the kids. We came back not to return here, but in order to see my husband and to move to our next home, which won't be in Elad, but a place where we can meet my husband. This is where I'm heading towards. Itzan Akhmani is one of the residents who opposed an immediate return to the area. She's worried about the effect on her children. They don't feel safe here. Every little noise makes them jump. They asked me to lock the doors and to cover the windows, just like on October 7th, when there was an infiltration threat to the village. When we drive in the car, my young child is hiding because he's afraid that a terrorist will see him and abduct him. It's sad. Moving in between different houses, Itzan is trying to maintain a routine for her family. The kids haven't been in school for a long time now, so when we come here to visit, we practice math in Hebrew, so they won't forget. But other families are reaching different solutions, such as this alternative school, which was opened by volunteers a few days ago. After more than two months, as my family started falling apart, I decided that no matter what, I'm coming back home to Ain Habsor. In the first few weeks, I helped my husband, who was a farmer. His high workers left, and the situation was very bad. After a month, I understood that I need to take care of my kids. It's been three months already, and my kids didn't process what happened here on October 7th. They are lacking a social and educational framework. The gaps are enormous. These kids aren't in school since June. Professor Geffner's son, Alon, says he's happy to return. You're not afraid from the war, from bombing, from... I'm a little bit afraid, but I'm trying to be positive. Ain Habsor was established in 1982 by a group of Jewish settlers who were evacuated from the Yammid district in the Sinai Peninsula as part of the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt. The Klakeh was a young child when Yammid was evacuated. Now she faces another separation from her home. However, she says that the situation is completely different to that of 42 years ago. The feeling is very different. When we were evacuated from Sinai, at least from what I remember and from what I was told, the feeling was that the country was taking care of us and that it would help us rebuild our community. Today, no one tells you what will happen tomorrow. It's even difficult to join other communities. Caught between the basic need for security and safety, and the traumatic memories of October 7th, and on the other hand, the need for stability and a strong yearning for home, the people of Ain Habsor, like many other Israelis, are still waiting to decide on their next step, as the war in Gaza continues and the solution is yet not on the horizon. That's all for this edition of I-24 News. We have rolling coverage providing you with the latest from Israel. We'll be back at the top of the hour for more news and updates. Be sure to follow us on our website, i-24news.tv, and across our social media platforms. I'm Sivana Rave. Thank you for watching. Did you know that Martin Luther King's famous 1968 mountaintop speech was based on his trip to the Promised Land? Well, now, 55 years later, his prophetic words are coming true. Hundreds of African-American women took a journey of a lifetime to the Holy Land. We'll introduce you to the amazing female spiritual religious leaders who are infusing new energy into the next generation of African-Americans. Rave, and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv. Today is Day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues. The IDF announced the 24-year-old Sergeant First Class in Reserves, El Kanan Nulander, from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the Central Gaza Strip. He was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas. A senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hossein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel, including a recent strike on an IDF base, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon yesterday. Despite international efforts to prevent escalation, crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and addressed the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, discussing the phased transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict. Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide. Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation. Take a listen. We know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians who hides in and fires from schools, from hospitals makes this incredibly challenging. But the daily toll on civilians in Gaza, particularly on children, is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza. And as the IDF scales down its forces there, we agreed to down a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission. It will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north. Now, this is not gonna happen overnight. There are serious security, infrastructure, and humanitarian challenges. But the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome. And joining us now in studio is head of research at the IDSF Habitronistim, Ori Sakhar, and senior journalist Yadiyot Akhronot, Daily. Ben Dror, Yamini, thank you both for coming in. Ben Dror, I'd like to speak to you about the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken's visit to Israel as part of a broader Middle East regional trip. What was his message coming here to Israel? His message actually is what he wants to achieve at the end is a kind of a ceasefire. Why? Because, yes, the majority in the American public is still supporting Israel, but he hears the people who are totally against, and we saw what happened in one of the conferences of President Biden when people were shouting from the audience. So he does understand that maybe, just maybe they have a problem. I'm not sure that the way that they behave is the right way because the point is that you do not have to put the pressure on Israel. You have to put the pressure on the leaders of the Hamas. They are the people who refuse again and again to any kind of disarming the Gaza Strip and other proposals that actually were initiated from the international community, speaking about the EU, speaking about the Quartet. And unfortunately, and I have to criticize my own government, they do not use it. They do not use it. They can initiate something like that. You know what? I know the answer. If Israel will suggest ceasefire for disarming the Gaza Strip, we know that they're going to say yes. But speaking about the international arena, Israel can only benefit from such an initiative, but Israel is not doing anything. And the outcome is that we have this kind of international pressure, as we saw yesterday from Anthony Blinken, unfortunately. So we're seeing international pressure and certainly American pressure. Yes, Israel should initiate because it should be that headlines in the international media will be not that Hamas is asking for ceasefire. It should be the opposite. Israel is asking for a ceasefire, yes, for disarming the Gaza Strip. Let them say no. Don't take them no upon yourself. And that, unfortunately, what Israel is doing. And you believe a ceasefire, calling out for a ceasefire on Israel's behalf is the right move at this point when not all of the war's objectives were not yet fulfilled. What I'm talking about, we have a problem in the international public opinion. What I'm suggesting will help Israel in that respect. I'm not saying that they are going to accept it. We both know that they are not going to accept it. So it's a win-win situation. If they will say yes, great. We don't have to shoot anymore and international power whoever will come in order to dismantle the Gaza Strip. They're saying yes to what, exactly? If they will say yes to what? To releasing the hostages? To disarming, yeah, yeah, yeah. Both, of course, Israel will put the preconditions, hostages disarming the Gaza Strip removing all the Hamas leadership, not even killing them, I don't care about them. Why not to initiate something? Why always, but always to be pushed by the United States? Why always to be pushed by the international community? We have to initiate something and we do not do it, unfortunately. But has Israel not said time and again that these are the objectives of the war? Demilitarizing, releasing hostages? Of course, we have to dismantle the Hamas. I mean, I'm supporting all the goals of this operation. But, but, but, we are losing power in the international community, in the public opinion. We are losing power and eventually, it happened already three times before that we were doing very well on the ground and we had to stop it in Lebanon, second in the two big operations in Gaza Strip. We had to stop, we were forced actually to stop. Do we want it again? And that's what we might face in the next upcoming weeks. Bendro and Orr, please stay with us. We'll be back to you in a moment. But in the meantime, joining us from Southern Israel is our I-24 news correspondent, Pierre Kloeschendler. Pierre, what's the situation on the ground? The IDF just announced that the operation, the ground offensive in the central sector, which started more or less on December 23 and in Hanyunas southward, which started in December 2nd, are going in full force and even deepening, especially in Hanyunas. The IDF announces that there were 150 strikes on presumed terror targets in the refugee camp on El Mourazi, which is in the central sector of the Gaza Strip and which has been invaded by the Israeli army, as well as El Borej, another refugee camp you may have heard now, the outgoing of artillery fire, which is in this direction, in the direction of Jucho Redic, which is at the entrance of the four refugee camps of the central sector of the Gaza Strip. We know that scores of terrorists have been killed during those strikes, which are supporting the ground forces operating in the area. And the U.S. has been calling on Israel to allow the return of residents of Gaza to the northern area of the Gaza Strip. What's the response at this point? Well, the response is that the Israeli government has accepted that the UN Special Envoy for the Gaza Strip will be visiting the northern sector of the Gaza Strip at some point. There's no definite date, but there are absolutely no definite date for the return of displaced Palestinians. There are about a million who moved from the battleground in the northern sector of the Gaza Strip when the ground offensive started on October 27. Now the war in the northern Gaza Strip is a low-intensity warfare. That means cleaning the area of unexploded ordinance minds that have been stirring the northern sector of the Gaza Strip, as well as cleansing the towns that are facing the communities in Israel, eradicating those towns because of anti-tank guided missile, because of sniper fire before the war. And as a result, the Israeli army is creating some sort of perimeter, security perimeter in which the population will not be able to leave because it's a field of ruins. So at this moment, there is absolutely no schedule for the return of the million people that were displaced from the north to the south. Pyrracle Chandler, thank you very much. And back in studio with us are Bendro Yamini and Ori Sakhar. Oh, we are hearing our correspondent, Pyrr, down south by the border with Gaza, and we're hearing him speak of a low-intensity warfare in the southern part. What does that mean, Izak? I think Israel should practice what it preaches. I mean, you cannot, on the one hand, define an objective of the war, which is defeating Hamas and annihilating all of its political-military infrastructure and bringing back all the hostages, and only then move to stage three, which is purifying so-called clearing the area from terrorists for a year, two, three to come, like we did after the defensive shield operation in Judensim area. And right now, we are hearing double voices, and that starts to concern, to be honest. We see how the visit of a Secretary of State Blinken representing precisely the attitude of October 6th. We cannot go back to the days before the October 7th attack, where we chant the same rhythm and the same hymn of two-state solution, of humanitarian corridors, of bringing people back to their homes of independent Palestinian state. We need to think and echo a whole different attitude because we see the mounting international pressure come within Israeli initiative to the day after in Gaza, start enacting it in the ground. If we have sufficient control over the northern Gaza Strip, we should continue and start planning the military, the martial law that will be there for a couple of months before the final stage as we envision the Gaza Strip. Residents should not go back to northern Gaza. IDF troops are still fighting there, and the mission is far from over, far from over. And I'm having, I'm struggling to understand why the Israeli, both administration and public officials do not come with clear vision for the Gaza Strip to conquer the entire Gaza Strip, to clear the entire Gaza Strip from terrorists. And even if the United States pressures us to go for the two-state solution, at the end of the day, that represent precisely what Blinken said, we are aware of the problems, we're aware of the issues, but we don't have a better solution. So if they don't have better solutions, let's bring our own solutions. And there is so much more to develop and speak about this, but I do want to discuss with you a new report that came out by Ashok al-Ausat, saying basically that the October 7th massacre was planned out a decade ago, before the 2014 operation, and was kept top secret. Only five top Hamas operatives knew the exact details, and I quote what they say here, only five people, the leader of the Hamas movement in the Gaza Strip, Yahis Sunwar, the leader of the Al-Qasam Brigades, Mohamed Adef, and one of his most important aides and the most wanted by Israel, Mohamed Al-Sunwar, which is Yahis' brother, and the leader of the movement, Rahui Mushtaha, who is close to Sinoir, along with Ayman Nofal, one of DEF's close associates, and the former official in charge of Al-Qasam Intelligence. So we see that they were able to keep this top secret for a very long time. We also saw, by the way, that the Hamas leadership in Gaza made a pretty much independent decision, not even informing most of the Hamas leadership abroad, not to mention the Iranians, et cetera. Look, these kind of reports keep coming, and my suggestion is that many more will come, but at the end of the day, yes. Israel was aware that Hamas has such plans, simply because it televised them all around social media and all around the Hamas state media, inviting reporters to witness maneuvers and drills that it conducted to abduct Israelis, to take over townships, to take over military bases. Hezbollah does the same thing last summer. He did exactly the same thing, inviting media to document Hezbollah troops taking over the Galilee. And I don't think that anyone was surprised by the very intention. I think the surprise by the defense apparatus was the sheer scale of it and the sheer scope. And- The execution. Exactly, the execution, and quite literally the execution. And unfortunately, we saw the scale of brutality and the level of response by Israel, which was insufficient to say the least, that will have to be investigated later. But we do know that, to be honest, there's a difference between, let's say, knowledge and internalization. We need not internalize Hamas's intentions. We kind of derogated our enemies by not believing that they will actually be capable of doing all these things. They would, they're only touting their media outlets in order to gain some domestic support. And this kind of derogation and not estimating your enemy as much as we should has been characteristic, had been characteristic of the October 6th paradigm. This is not something we can go back to. And I think at the end of the day, we should apply the same logic elsewhere. What are Hezbollah's true intentions? What are the Arabs, the Palestinians, the Densimers' true intentions? What are Iran's true intentions striving to a nuclear bomb? All these things should be very carefully considered. And we hear in the same report, Palestinian sources say that the flood, which is what they call the massacre that they executed, like you say, this flood began with only 70 fighters, Hamas fighters, who carried out the surprise attack. They were trained. They were selected from hundreds of operatives. They were trained all the way until this very moment when they carried out these specific attacks. Absolutely. And they keep training. And I think they kind of sort of neutralize the awareness on the part of Israeli systems by keeping on drilling and keeping on maneuvering. And not doing the real-time attack until it actually happened. So we kind of assume that there were still drills and still maneuvers, et cetera. But I think that really what the reporter just mentioned said, that only 70 people were trained for that. And we saw how 3,000 Gazans invaded, of which we assume hundreds, if not thousands, of Nukhba fighters. But hundreds, if not thousands, of other Gazans, who were the Zara'in, as they say, the masses, who invaded after the Hamas attack or the aftermath, kept murdering and stealing and committing all sorts of atrocious crimes. At the end of the day, I think Hamas maybe was even surprised by its own success. It definitely envisioned how its own elite units will react. But encouraging the masses to go out was something it planned like it did in the riots on the fence. But had they expected it would do such a phenomenal success as far as much as it's sad to say it, I think they expected even much more. They expected to penetrate deep into Jenin's Samaria, reached the heart of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. And in that sense, the bravery of the police, of the border police, of the IDF, showed that it was definitely Israel that met them on the other side of the fence, although it would have to be investigated at the later stage. Well, thankfully, that didn't happen. Because there are two conceptions, two attitudes. One is saying, when they declare something like, we want to exterminate all the Jews. We want to exterminate all the Christians. They say it, by the way, in the TV channel. They say it. And for example, I mean, we don't have to go 10 years back, which is very interesting. But Yakhir Sinwa just declared exactly what they are going to do in 2018. Now, what was the conception? If they say it, they do not mean it. And which is a big mistake? Because when they say it, they mean it. They are going to carry it out. And that's what so many people in Israel, and I'm speaking about the army, and I'm speaking about the government, they did not want to believe that they mean every word that they said. I do remember sitting with an Iranian professor some years ago. And he told me, look, whatever the leaders of Iran are saying, they mean it. We forgot that. They absolutely mean it. And they were underestimated. Ben Roryamini and Ori Sakhal, thank you very much for joining us. The US military central command says that US and UK forces shot down 21 drones and missiles fired by Yemen-based Houthis into the southern Red Sea toward international shipping lanes, this following 26 Houthi attacks on commercial shipping lanes in the Red Sea since November 19. Earlier today, I spoke to I-24 News Middle East correspondent Ariel Oceran. Take a listen. This 26th attack by the Houthis really illustrates amplifies the lack of action by the US-led coalition against the Houthis that do not appear deterred even despite a statement by 14 countries, including the US, that the Houthis will bear responsibility for these attacks. We're talking about an attack last night off the coast of Yemen, 18 drones, two cruise missiles, and an anti-ship ballistic missile. We're all launched as a complex attack according to SENDCOMS statement. And they were all intercepted by American and British warships that are positioned in the area. Now, the reason I mention this statement by 14 countries is because in SENDCOMS announcement or statement regarding this attack, they also include a reference to that statement at the end of it, which it's hard not to read it as passive aggression towards American political leaders. This is the US Central Command saying that on January 3rd, 14 countries, including the US, issued a joint statement stating that Houthis will bear the responsibility for the consequences should they continue to threaten lives of the global economy or the free flow of commerce in the region's critical waterways. So far, we have not seen any proactive steps taken by this UN coalition to stop these attacks besides diplomatic steps. Later today, the UN Security Council is expected to hold a vote that will condemn these Houthi attacks. But given that this follows just other statements that are not only condemning the attacks, but warning of their continuation, it is not clear whether this additional statement will have any implications as to the security reality in the waters of the Red Sea. So far, they have not done that. Most communities from the Gaza envelope left their homes three months ago. Now the community of Enhabesor is facing a new challenge as some people return home and others refuse to. Our correspondents, Uri Shapira and Karmit Molcho, have more in this report. A small group gathered last week to discuss the future plans for the village. These include a new basketball court and a communal garden. Nothing exceptional, perhaps, except the village in question, is Enhabesor, adjacent to the Gaza Strip. We're going to be here now today. You hear the bombing behind us. It's probably the most safe place in Israel right now. There's hundreds of thousands of soldiers few miles away. And it's going to be safe. Because if this place is not going to be safe in a few months or a year from now, no place in Israel is going to be safe. This is the test of the country of our generation. It's our shift to make it better, safer, and stronger than what it was. Most of Enhabesor's residents were evacuated to Elat in other locations after the murderous Hamas assault of October 7. Village resident Professor Iftah Geffner supports this quick return and the recovery of this community. That's not everyone agrees with him. Each person can do whatever he wants. But as a community, I think that the government position should be to wait for a second. We will find an answer to all of your needs. Now we have the opportunity to solve the issue, and you'll come back once the place is safe. For many in this community, Enhabesor is stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, it is close to the Gaza border, and there are constant threats in the area. But as opposed to other places like near Oz and Kibbutz Bairi, Enhabesor managed to block the Hamas infiltration on October 7, mostly thanks to the security squad and Samseh Ilak. And as some communities moved to permanent residency in cities like Tel Aviv, others like Enhabesor are still staying in hotels. We came here because we didn't have a choice. We moved to Elad. It is three hours away from here. My husband was called up to the IDF. If he was a few hours away, he could have driven to Elad just to see us. The distance in the time without him is very difficult, for me and for the kids. We came back not to return here, but in order to see my husband and to move to our next home, which won't be in Elad, but a place where we can meet my husband. This is where I'm heading towards. Itzan Akmani is one of the residents who opposed an immediate return to the area. She's worried about the effect on her children. They don't feel safe here. Every little noise makes them jump. They asked me to lock the doors and to cover the windows, just like on October 7th, when there was an infiltration threat to the village. When we drive in the car, my young child is hiding because he's afraid that a terrorist will see him and abduct him. It's sad. Moving in between different houses, Itzan is trying to maintain a routine for her family. The kids haven't been in school for a long time now, so when we come here to visit, we practice math in Hebrew so they won't forget. But other families are reaching different solutions, such as this alternative school, which was opened by volunteers a few days ago. After more than two months, as my family started falling apart, I decided that no matter what, I'm coming back home to Ain Habsor. In the first few weeks, I helped my husband, who was a farmer. His high workers left, and the situation was very bad. After a month, I understood that I need to take care of my kids. It's been three months already, and my kids didn't process what happened here on October 7th. They are lacking a social and educational framework. The gaps are enormous. These kids aren't in school since June. Professor Geffner's son, Alon, says he's happy to return. I'm a little bit afraid, but I'm trying to be positive. Ain Habsor was established in 1982 by a group of Jewish settlers who were evacuated from the Yarmid district in the Sinai Peninsula as part of the peace agreement between Israel and Egypt. The Klakeh was a young child when Yarmid was evacuated. Now she faces another separation from her home. However, she says that the situation is completely different to that of 42 years ago. The feeling is very different. When we were evacuated from Sinai, at least from what I remember and from what I was told, the feeling was that the country was taking care of us and that it would help us rebuild our community. Today, no one tells you what will happen tomorrow. It's even difficult to join other communities. Caught between the basic need for security and safety and the traumatic memories of October 7th, and on the other hand, for stability and a strong yearning for home, the people of Ain Habsor, like many other Israelis, are still waiting to decide on their next step. As the war in Gaza continues, and a solution is yet not on the horizon. That's all for this edition of I-24 News. We have rolling coverage providing you with the latest from Israel. We'll be back at the top of the hour for more news and updates. Be sure to follow us on our website, and on our social media platforms. I'm Sivana Ravi. Thank you for watching. Did you know that Martin Luther King's famous 1968 mountaintop speech was based on his trip to the Promised Land? Well now, 55 years later, his prophetic words are coming true. Hundreds of African-American women took a journey of a lifetime to the Holy Land. We'll introduce you to the amazing female spiritual and religious leaders who are infusing new energy to the next generation of African-Americans. For news, I'm Sivana Ravi. And these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv. Today is day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues. The IDF announced that 24-year-old Sergeant First Class in Reserves El Cana Nulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the central Gaza Strip. He was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas. A senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hossein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel, including a recent strike on an IDF base, was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday. Despite international efforts to prevent escalation, crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon. U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and addressed the humanitarian crisis in Gaza discussing the phased transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict. Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide. Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation. Take a listen. The IDF campaign makes this incredibly challenging. But the daily toll on civilians in Gaza particularly on children is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza and as the IDF scales down its forces there we agreed to down a plan for the U.N. to carry out an assessment mission. It will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north. Now, this is not going to happen overnight. There are serious security infrastructure and humanitarian challenges. But the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome. And joining us now from southern Israel is our I-24 news correspondent, Pierre Kuleshendler. Pierre, what's the situation on the ground? Well, per the IDF overnight there were 150 strikes on presumed terror targets in the central sector of the Gaza Strip especially in the El-Morazi refugee camp and further south in Hanyunas where the operation is deepening. Scores of terrorists have been killed per the IDF. Now, Pierre, according to Lebanese media, Israeli special forces are reportedly conducting intensive intelligence activity in the Sinai Desert in Sudan and in Libya out of fear that Hamas might attempt to smuggle its leaders or the Israeli hostages outside of Gaza. What do we know about this? Well, these are reports emanating from two Arab-language newspaper Al Arab Al Jadid which is a Qatari newspaper and Al-Ahbar a Lebanese newspaper which is close to the terrorist organization Hezbollah. And there is a very sensitive area which the IDF hasn't touched yet. It's the Philadelphia Corridor. It's a strip of a narrow strip of land 13 kilometers long between Egypt and the Gaza Strip. The city of Rafar which numbers unusual times prior to the war 200,000 inhabitants now is inhabited by 1.3 million Palestinians who have displaced themselves from the battleground safer zones of fighting in Rafar. There's only pinpointing targets on presumed terror targets but there is no ground offensive and the fear of the army is that the Hamas will smuggle the leadership both political and military of Hamas as well as the hostages inside Egyptian territory in the Sinai peninsula and then be transferred to Sudan or to Libya which share a border with Egypt and eventually reach Lebanon or Iran. And as a result special units of intelligence of the IDF are operating in those areas in order to check that no such smuggling of people will occur. Pierre Klossendler down on Israel's southern border. Thank you very much. Joining us now in studio is former Senior Intelligence Officer at the IDF and Security Analyst Rafael Roussalmi. Thank you for coming in. We're hearing our reporter Pierre Klossendler speak about these reports according to Lebanese media of a concern that Israel has that hostages, Israeli hostages and possibly Hamas leaders may be smuggled out of the Gaza Strip. So far as we know Egyptians are being very vigilant on their side of the border and we know that the weak spot is the possibility of tunnels going from Gaza into Sinai. Right now we do trust the Egyptians in a way because the Hamas has asked no later than last night even for some Arab countries to supply it with more weapons. These weapons can only arrive into Gaza through these tunnels so the Egyptians have no interest in seeing these weapons arrive and they are doing their job patrolling all the famous Philadelphia Road etc. We still cannot operate freely we would want to strike harder in this area of Rafael and Philadelphia Road but the Egyptians are the masters there and they do not want us to interfere at least not without coordinating with them. So far we do estimate that the hostages and the high ranking leaders of the Hamas are still in Gaza they haven't taken this escape route which is not that easy to take anyway but still would they do that it might not be such a terrible thing because if they start moving and moving the hostages that's when we have a chance to get them because right now they are underground in Hanyunis or somewhere in the south of Gaza not moving at all in bunkers and the hostages are used as human shields for the high leaders of the Hamas would they start moving it's always like that like when you have an element in the killing it's because the person is on the move as soon as they are on the move it would actually give us a chance to recuperate the hostages and hit Hamas leaders so it's very dangerous for them to move would they succeed in moving would they actually reach Lebanon and Iran maybe Egypt and in Egypt they would have a problem to move freely and then to reach Sudan all this is not so simple to accomplish but would they you have to think that the deal would be the same I mean whether the hostages are held in Gaza or they are held in Tehran when it comes to negotiating the liberation the conditions and the negotiations will be the same does it really matter where they are held Well I think that for many for Israelis especially hearing this kind of the idea that these hostages may be lost around the world may be transported elsewhere is catastrophic Well they might be better treated than being at the hands of the Hamas terrorists because right now unfortunately for them and for us psychologically they are held by very ferocious people of no heart, no conscience it might be that if for instance they are in Tehran they will be judged as a political asset and the Iranians might treat them better because they would be like a card for negotiations for the claims it might as I'm saying it's not necessarily a bad thing that they would be moved out and first of all you know what I'm going to be a bit silly but the fact that you just move might be good for them psychologically and just to take your breath of fresh air might just be good for them because right now they are stuck in one dark room they haven't moved they haven't seen the sunlight for weeks so I don't see what's the tragedy in the fact that they are moved from one place to another or to even to another country even when you speak of the almost impossible mission of attacking them really and liberate them in some kind of anti-best-style operation this might be also easier to accomplish abroad than it is inside the tunnels of Gaza so all in all I would be so worried about it and as I said wherever they will be they cannot be treated worse only better than where they are now and the deals that will be struck if they are struck will be the same the conditions will be the same so the only difference now is really to neutralize these tunnels to make sure because what we do not want is the Hamas leaders to escape and I don't think they will take that chance because I'm telling you they will have such a network from the Sinai which they do have they have a complicit mostly the Bedouin tribes you know they work for the the most so no problem to have a complicity there and bribe the police Egyptian police for a few dollars but then to go on inside Egyptian territory there is still the Egyptian intelligence in the Egyptian military there then to cross the border into Sudan or Libya this is not so easily done not easily achievable so you see the positive in perhaps such a move and all of this is according to Lebanese media I repeat we should start seeing the positive now that is there in general of course let's talk about the Philadelphia corridor you mentioned it this is a contentious area to be discussed by Israel with Egypt what's the source of the conflict regarding this region well really the Egyptians they are kind of a double standard on the one hand they say they are sovereign states and the Sinai it's theirs and the border between Gaza and Egypt is under their control their responsibility the Israelis don't have to mess up with Rafah and the Philadelphia road it's under Egyptian control on the other hand they wash their hands of anything that has to do with Gaza they don't want to do anything to help the humanitarian situation they do not want to participate in the day after security needs of the Gaza Strip they don't want to do anything so this is a contradiction that we have to deal with we are used over the I mean I've worked with the Egyptians for many many years we are used to this difficulty it's very difficult to work with them it's very frustrating but in the end we do reach agreements we do which solutions it's just painstaking and I think with the Rafiach problem we will reach some kind of understanding with the Egyptians they are already letting us operate militarily so we'll see until what level of intensity of operations they allow us to work and the rest they will say that they are doing the job and we are trusting them more or less because it is in their interest wouldn't that be in their interest we might not trust them to do the job but it is also in their interest that these tunnels should be blocked and that there should be any free movement between Gaza and the Sinai whether it's hostages, terrorists or weapons on the other side the Egyptians are not interested that this Rafiach border will be a border that can be crossed so easily by the Hamas and for its own interest right so that's the border with Egypt what about northern Gaza the IDF says that the north of Gaza is under control more strategic fighting needs to be done in the central and southern areas of Gaza now how is this to be executed this kind of pinpointed military operations in the southern area of Gaza the north is going to start looking a lot like the West Bank meaning you have at the day after we'll have to find some kind of a solution who sits there is there a police force a Palestinian police force an international force we don't know right now there's nobody make law and order and security in the north of Gaza is the IDF but the IDF doesn't have to sit inside the northern part of the Gaza Strip anymore because we are in control generally of that part of the Gaza Strip we can be on the outskirts of this area and only come in when needed which is the West Bank we do not have to sit in the West Bank with our troops we only go in or in Naples when there is a need or when we have the intel that can lead us to terrorists so this can be done this should be done also at the end the day after that's what should be done there will be an interim period between the end of the war if we reach that our objective and there is no more Hamas as a ruler there will be Hamas but not as a ruler between the end of the war and the day after that means when we have taken dreams off there will be an interim period where only the IDF can ensure the security in the Gaza Strip it will have to be ensured like being on the outskirts or being on a belt around the Strip and only going in with raids or incursions when need be not to sit there, not to occupy we do not want to stay there it's dangerous for our soldiers we know that there will be even when Hamas loses the rule and control of Gaza there will still be pockets of hard nut terrorists being able to act even if there are only a few but they are dangerous the problem with the Washington administration is they want to reach the day after we are not even in the day before it's really too early they won't even want the population already to go back to the north there is nowhere to go everything is in ruins, you have to rebuild first so you are saying they are trying to fast track a process that is in the midst of thank you very much Israel recently appointed a former Supreme Court Chief to serve at the International Court of Justice Genocide hearings in the hog on Friday he will be tasked with defending the Jewish state against the claims made by South Africa which would follow the case put forth earlier. Our political and international first correspondent Bhatia Leventhal explains who Aharon Balak is and what his case will be and if he is likely to win. Take a look on the 11th and 12th of January the International Court of Justice stage will be set and the question will be asked is Israel guilty of genocide in Gaza apart from the 15 permanent members of the ICJ both parties made themselves nominated judge to join the deliberations the South African ruling ANC party has tapped its representative Israel's pick was Aharon Balak as a former Supreme Court Chief he is well respected internationally but despite being recommended by Benjamin Netanyahu himself Balak is anything but an ally of the incumbent Israeli government they demonstrated against him they made him the enemy of the nation but at the moment of truth the Israeli government also realized that he was a knowledgeable and respected expert in the world and therefore the Prime Minister chose him to be a judge on behalf of the State of Israel and the Hague I hope they also apologize to him South Africa aims to prove Israel is indiscriminately killing civilians in the Gaza Strip they will likely show footage of many destroyed residential buildings, hospitals, schools and mosques as well as those injured so as to make their case in defense Balak will likely use this as his main argument it is not we who have come to perpetrate genocide, it is Hamas it would murder all of us if it could in contrast, the IDF is acting as morally as possible it is doing everything to avoid harming civilians while Hamas is doing everything to harm them and is using them as human shields Israel has also set to screen a compilation of harrowing scenes of torture, rape decapitation, murder and kidnapping from the October 7th onslaught match of which was filmed by Hamas themselves the proof is there, but it will not all go Israel's way there will be evidence too that will reflect poorly on the Jewish state more than 70% of the Israeli public today supports a humanitarian solution of encouraging the voluntary immigration of gardens and their absorption in other countries we cannot afford the reality where 2 million people wake up every morning with the aspiration to murder us the evidence supporting Israel's case is plentiful but Barak is up against a hostile state and world body either way the panel needs to consider their arguments and review the supporting files the big question is if there is indeed a case of genocide and if so will justice be served and to whom meanwhile US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken commented on this claim yesterday emphasizing the irony of accusing Israel of committing genocide while Iran and its regional proxies are in fact the ones calling out for the mass murder of Jews, take a listen Hamas Hezbollah the Houthis as well as their support of Iran continue to openly call for the annihilation of Israel and the mass murder of Jews Joining us now is Professor of International Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Robbie Sable thank you for joining thank you for having me Robbie Israeli media reports that the Shin Bet chief recommended showing evidence of Hamas ties to UNRWA and aimed to quote embarrass the United Nations now today this was released by UN watch that a telegram group of thousands of teachers in Gaza celebrated in their posts the Hamas atrocities is addressing all of these things a smart move for Israel that won't be the main fuss of Israel's defense Israel's defense will be whatever happened here was not genocide it was an attempt to genocide and we'll try and prove that by the fact that we took tremendous efforts to avoid civilian casualties they're not in our interest moving the population away from battle scenes was meant and helped prevent civilian casualties in other words rather than trying to kill civilians we made a tremendous effort to prevent it as opposed to Hamas whose objective was to kill civilians that would be the main fuss of Israel's defense at the court and what do we know about the judges who will be participating in this panel tomorrow and on Friday we must bear in mind that the judges appointed by the UN General Assembly with the approval of the Security Council which means they reflect the these build up of the General Assembly and there's a lot of states that are not democratic hostile to Israel some of them have judges on the court many of the judges are fair impartial and comfortable democracies but some don't and we have to bear that it's not the court of law that we would have chosen it's not composed of 15 impartial judges some of them are impartial some are clearly not we'll have a judge for instance from the Lebanon from Somalia, these people are not going to be objective and unhappily we have to take this into consideration and Aharon Barak will be on the panel of judges how will he be participating in this I think they'll give him the respect due to an eminent jurist who's fought for human rights in Israel he was a lecturer at Harvard but he'll be one judge among 17 and I hope he can influence them we can't be certain of that now we know that Israeli ministers have made several comments about voluntary immigration of the Gaza population how will this be hurting Israel's case voluntary immigration is not a crime and it's not Israeli's policy but it's perfectly legitimate for say look those who want to can leave there's immigration from every country in the world if so long as it's voluntary and there was no talk about making it involuntary it's not a crime whether it's wise politically or not is a different issue but it's certainly not a violation of the laws of war or war crime to say people will voluntarily want to leave Gaza and by the way as far as I know many of them would like to if they had the opportunity they'll be very happy to move to other countries now how long will this case take there's two stages the first stage is South Africa's asking for an interim order for Israel to stop fighting and this will take there'll be two days of hearing that's tomorrow and Friday and normally the decision will be given within a week or so then the actual case can take years and I don't think that's what South Africa is interested in they're interested in trying to get an order to stop Israel fighting because it's harming Hamas and they're in this case with Hamas so the first stage will be to try and get an interim order against Israel to cease fighting and the actual case I think will be matter of years ahead do we know what kind of proof South Africa will present to make this case yes they'll quote the statements by Israeli politicians and they'll say look so many civilians have been killed that's proof that it was an attempt to genocide and of course Israel's answer would be we made every effort to minimize the civilian casualties and Hamas was interested in they put their arms, their rockets next to civilians civilian buildings in mosques, next to hospitals in order to increase civilian casualties to be able to prove that that's what Israel's doing this will be the crux of the discussion of the dispute between them and the court and again how the judges decide the judges who are not impartial now briefly just so that the public understands why is South Africa taking the lead on this to begin with why is it within their interest do you think is this a moral obligation they feel in light of their own history I think it's a combination of two they want to prove they're anti-west and they say Israel is a bastion of the western world they want to carry favor with the Arab states and also they have a background of the PLO supported the anti-apartheid regime and they feel a moral duty to support the Palestinians so it's a combination of the two they want to help the Palestinians but to prove that South Africa is leading the third world against the west so I think it's a combination of these two elements now do we know what steps the court will take in the final ruling can they give a warrant to Israel to stop its hostilities so-called hostilities its operations I don't know what they do South Africa wants them to issue an order to Israel stop fighting and what the court will do we don't know but that's the request of South Africa that Israel should be ordered to stop fighting and therefore save the Hamas leadership which apparently South Africa wants to do and do we know that the Hamas atrocities will they be presented in this court case we will present again and as far as I know we'll even present a film filmed by the Hamas people themselves showing that they went out to murder and to rape and to destroy we will be showing this and it's part of the element that Israel act in self-defense we didn't attack Hamas and that's something the world seems to be ignoring and Israel's when attacked we do defend ourselves and this is certainly one of the most documented atrocities that is out there and can be proven by Hamas themselves by Hamas operatives themselves Hamas terrorists thank you very much Robby Sable thank you that's all for this edition of i24 news we have rolling coverage providing you with the latest from Israel we'll be back at the top of the hour for more news and updates be sure to follow us on our website i24news.tv and across our social media platforms I'm Sivanrave thank you for watching a state of war families completely gunned down in their beds we have no idea where is she as our soldiers are fighting on the front lines but the general perception is something that certainly needs to to be fought as well for news I'm Sivanrave and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv today is day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues the IDF announced that 24 year old sergeant 1st class in reserves Elkanan Nulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the central Gaza Strip he was a combat medic in the 99th division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas a senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hossein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel during a recent strike on an IDF base was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday despite international efforts to prevent escalation crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza discussing the phase transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the international court of justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation take a listen we know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians who hides in and fires from schools from hospitals makes this incredibly challenging but the daily toll on civilians in Gaza particularly on children is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza and as the IDF scales down its forces there we agreed to down a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission it will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north now this is not going to happen overnight there are serious security infrastructure and humanitarian challenges but the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome and joining us now from southern Israel is our I-24 news correspondent Pierre Kuleshendler Pierre what's the situation on the ground well per the IDF overnight there were 150 strikes on presumed terror targets in the central sector of the Gaza Strip especially in the El-Morazi refugee camp and further south in Hanyunas where the operation is deepening scores of terrorists have been killed per the IDF now Pierre according to Lebanese media Israeli special forces are reportedly conducting intensive intelligence activity in the Sinai desert in Sudan and in Libya out of fear that Hamas might attempt to smuggle its leaders or the Israeli hostages outside of Gaza what do we know about this well these are reports emanating from two Arab language newspaper Arab Al-Jadid which is a Qatari newspaper and Al-Akhbar a Lebanese newspaper which is close to the terrorist organization Hezbollah and there is a very sensitive area which the IDF hasn't touched yet in the Philadelphia corridor it's a strip of narrow strip of land 13 kilometers long between Egypt and the Gaza Strip the city of Rafar which numbers in usual times prior to the war 200,000 inhabitants now is inhabited by 1.3 million Palestinians who have displaced themselves from the battleground to safer zones in Rafar there's only pinpointing targets on presumed terror targets but there is no ground offensive and the fear of the armies that the Hamas will smuggle the leadership both political and military of Hamas as well as the hostages inside Egyptian territory in the Sinai Peninsula and then be transferred to Sudan to Libya which are which share a border with Egypt and eventually reach Lebanon or Iran and as a result special units of intelligence of the IDF are operating in those areas in order to check that no such smuggling of people will occur. Joining us now in studio is our senior intelligence officer at the IDF and security analyst thank you for coming in we're hearing our reporter these reports according to Lebanese media of a concern that Israel has that hostages, Israeli hostages and possibly Hamas leaders may be smuggled out of the Gaza Strip so far as we know the Egyptians are being very vigilant on their side of the border and we know that the weak spot is the possibility of tunnels going from Gaza into Sinai right now we do trust the Egyptians in a way because the Hamas has asked no later than last night even for some Arabic countries to supply it with more weapons these weapons can only arrive from Sinai into Gaza through these tunnels so the Egyptians have no interest in seeing these weapons arrive and they are doing their job patrolling all the famous Fila Delphi Road etc we still cannot operate freely we want to strike harder in this area of Rafiakh and Fila Delphi Road but the Egyptians are the masters there and they do not want us to interfere at least not without coordinating with them so so far we do estimate that the hostages and the high ranking leaders of the Hamas are still in Gaza they haven't taken this escape route which is not that easy to take anyway but still would they do that it might not be such a terrible thing because if they start moving and moving the hostages that's when we have a chance to get them because right now they are underground in Hanyunis or somewhere in the south of Gaza not moving at all in bunkers and the hostages are used as human shields for the high leaders of the Hamas would they start moving it's always like that like when you have an eliminated killing it's because the person is on the move as soon as they are on the move it will actually give us a chance to recuperate the hostages and hit Hamas leaders so it's very dangerous for them to move would they succeed in moving would they actually reach Lebanon and Iran? I doubt it very much maybe in Egypt they would have a problem to move freely and then to reach Sudan all this is not so simple to accomplish but would they you have to think that the deal would be the same I mean whether the hostages are held in Gaza or they are held in Tehran when it comes to negotiating the liberation the conditions and the negotiations will be the same does it really matter where they are held? Well I think that for many for Israelis especially hearing this kind of the idea that these hostages may be lost around the world maybe transported elsewhere is catastrophic well they might be better treated than being at the hands of the Hamas terrorists because right now unfortunately for them and for us psychologically they are held by very ferocious people people who have no heart, no conscience it might be that if for instance they are in Tehran they will be judged as a political asset and the Iranians might treat them better because they would be like a card for negotiations for the claims it might not as I'm saying it's not necessarily a bad thing that they would be moved out and first of all you know what I'm gonna be a bit silly but the fact that you just move might be good for them psychologically just to take a breath of fresh air might just be good for them because right now they are stuck in one dark room they haven't moved, they haven't seen the sunlight for weeks so I don't see what's the tragedy in the fact that they are moved from one place to another or even to another country even when you speak of the almost impossible mission of attacking them militarily and liberate them in some kind of textile operation this might be also easier to accomplish abroad than it is inside the tunnels of Gaza so all in all I would be so worried about it and as I said wherever they will be they cannot be treated worse only better than when they are now and the deals that will be struck if they are struck will be the same the conditions will be the same so the only difference now is we need to neutralize these tunnels to make sure because what we do not want is the Hamas leaders to escape and I don't think they will take that chance because I'm telling you they will have such a network from the Sinai which they do have, they have accomplices mostly the Bedouin tribes they work for the most so no problem to have a complicity there you can bribe the police, Egyptian police for a few dollars but then to go on inside Egyptian territory there is still the Egyptian intelligence in the Egyptian military there then to cross the border into Sudan or Libya this is not so easily done not easily achievable so you see the positive in perhaps such a move and all of this is according to Lebanese media I repeat we should start seeing the positive now because the negative we know that is there let's talk about the Philadelphia corridor you mentioned it this is a contentious area to be discussed by Israel with Egypt what's the source of the conflict regarding this region? well really the Egyptians they are kind of a double standard on the one hand they say they are a sovereign state and the Sinai is theirs and the border between Gaza and Egypt is under their control their responsibility they don't have to mess up with Rafa and the Philadelphia road it's under Egyptian control on the other hand they wash their hands of anything that has to do with Gaza they don't want to do anything to help the humanitarian situation they do not want to participate in the day after security needs of the Gaza Strip they don't want to do anything so this is a contradiction that we have to deal with we are used over the I mean I've worked with the Egyptians for many many years we are used to this difficulty it's very difficult to work with them it's very frustrating but in the end we do reach agreements we do reach solutions it's just painstaking and I think with their Afiach problem we will reach some kind of understanding with the Egyptians they're already letting us operate militarily we will see until what level of intensity of operations they allow us to to work and the rest they will say that they're doing the job and we are trusting them more or less because it is in their interest we might not trust them to do the job but it is also in their interest that these tunnels should be blocked and that there should be any free movement between Gaza and Sinai whether it's hostages, terrorists side the Egyptians are not interested that this Rafah border will be a border that can be crossed so easily by the Hamas and for its own interest right so that's the border with Egypt what about northern Gaza the IDF says that the north of Gaza is under control more strategic fighting needs to be done in the central and southern areas of Gaza now how is this to be executed pinpointed military operations in the southern area of Gaza well the the north is going to start looking a lot like the west bank meaning you have at the day after we'll have to find some kind of a solution who sits there, is there a police force a Palestinian police force an international force we don't know right now there's nobody the only force that can make law and order and security in the north of Gaza is the IDF so but the IDF doesn't have to sit inside the northern part of the Gaza Strip anymore because we are in control generally of that part of the Gaza Strip we can be on the outskirts of this area and only come in when needed which is the west bank, we do not have to sit in the west bank with our troops we only go into Jenin or Naples when there is a need and we have the intel that can lead us to terrorists so this can be done this should be done also at the end, the day after that's what should be done, there will be an interim period between the end of the war if we reach our objectives and there is no more Hamas as a ruler there will be Hamas but not as a ruler between the end of the war and the day after that means Blinken and dreams of there will be an interim period where only the IDF can ensure the security in the Gaza Strip it will have to be ensured like being on the outskirts or being on a belt around the Strip and only going in with raids or incursions when need be, not to sit there not to occupy, we do not want to stay there, it's dangerous for our soldiers we know that there will be even if the Hamas loses the rule and control of Gaza, there will still be pockets of hard nut terrorists being able to act even if only a few but they are dangerous the problem with their Washington administration is they want to reach the day after, we are not even in the day before, right? I mean it's really too early, they won't even want the population already to go back to the north, there's nowhere to go, there's nothing to go back to everything is in ruins, you have to rebuild first so you're saying they're trying to fast-track a process that is in the midst of it? Yeah, but too much thank you very much Rafael Israel recently appointed a former Supreme Court Chief to serve at the International Court of Justice Genocide hearings in the Hague on Friday he will be tasked with defending the Jewish State against the claims made by South Africa which would follow the case put forth by the accusing side a day earlier correspondent Bhatia Leventhal explains who Aharon Balak is and what his case will be and if he is likely to win, take a look on the 11th and 12th of January the International Court of Justice stage will be set and the question will be asked is Israel guilty of genocide in Gaza apart from the 15 permanent members of the ICJ both parties made themselves nominated judge to join the deliberations the South African ruling ANC party representative Israel's pick was Aharon Barak as a former Supreme Court Chief he is well respected internationally but despite being recommended by Benjamin Netanyahu himself Barak is anything but an ally of the incumbent Israeli government they demonstrated against him they made him the enemy of the nation but at the moment of truth the Israeli government also realized that he was a knowledgeable and respected legal expert in the world and therefore the minister chose him to be a judge on behalf of the state of Israel and the Hague I hope they also apologized to him South Africa aims to prove Israel is indiscriminately killing civilians in the Gaza Strip they will likely show footage of many destroyed residential buildings, hospitals, schools and mosques as well as those injured so as to make their case in defense Barak will likely use this as his main argument it is not we who have come to perpetrate genocide it is Hamas it would murder all of us if it could in contrast the IDF is acting as morally as possible it is doing everything to avoid harming civilians while Hamas is doing everything to harm them and is using them as human shields Israel has also set to screen a compilation of harrowing scenes of torture, rape, decapitation, murder and kidnapping from the October 7th onslaught which was filmed by Hamas themselves the proof is there but it will not all go Israel's way there will be evidence too that will reflect poorly on the Jewish state more than 70% of the Israeli public today supports a humanitarian solution of encouraging the voluntary immigration of gardens and their absorption in other countries we cannot afford a reality where 2 million people wake up every morning with the aspiration to murder us the evidence supporting Israel's case is plentiful but Baraki is up against a hostile state and world body either way the panel needs to consider their arguments and review the supporting files the big question is if there is indeed a case of genocide and if so will justice be served and to whom meanwhile US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken commented on this claim yesterday emphasizing the irony of accusing Israel of committing genocide while Iran and its regional proxies are in fact the ones calling out for the mass murder of Jews take a listen joining us now is professor of international law the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Robby Sable thank you for joining thank you for having me Robby Israeli media reports that the Shin Bet chief recommended showing evidence of Hamas ties to UNRWA and aimed to quote embarrass the United Nations and that's why we are here today we are here today we are here today to embarrass the United Nations now today this was released by UN watch that a telegram group of thousands of teachers in Gaza celebrated in their posts the Hamas atrocities is addressing all of these things a smart move for Israel that won't be the main fuss of Israel's defense Israel's defense will be whatever happened here was not genocide was not an attempt to genocide and we'll try and prove that by the fact that we took tremendous efforts to avoid civilian casualties they're not in our interest moving the population away from battle scenes was met and helped prevent civilian casualties in other words rather than trying to kill civilians we made a tremendous effort to prevent it as opposed to Hamas whose objective was to kill civilians and that would be the main fuss of Israel's defense at the court and what do we know about the judges who will be participating in this panel tomorrow and on Friday we must bear in mind that the judges appointed by the UN General Assembly with approval of the Security Council which means they reflect the these build up of the General Assembly and there's a lot of states that are not Democratic hostile to Israel and some of them have judges on the court many of the judges are fair, impartial and come from democracies but some don't and we have to bear that it's not the court of law that we would have chosen it's not composed of 15 impartial judges some of them are impartial some are clearly not we'll have a judge for instance from the Lebanon from Somalia these people are not going to be objective and unhappily we have to take this into consideration and Aharon Barak who will be on the panel of judges how does this, how will he be how will he be participating in this I think they'll give him the respect due to an eminent jurist who's fought for human rights in Israel he's lectured aboard he was lectured at Harvard but he'll be one judge among 17 and I hope he can influence them we can't be certain of that now we know that Israeli ministers have made several comments about the voluntary immigration of the Gaza population how will this be hurting Israel's case voluntary immigration is not a crime and it's not Israeli's policy but it's perfectly legitimate for say look those who want to can leave there's immigration from every country in the world if so long as it's voluntary and there was no talk about it making it involuntary whether it's wise politically or not is a different issue but it's certainly not a violation of the laws of war or war crime to say people who voluntarily want to leave Gaza and by the way as far as I know many of them would like to if they had the opportunity they'll be very happy to move to other countries now how long will this case take there's two stages the first stage is South Africa's asking for an interim order for Israel to stop fighting and this will take there'll be two days of hearing that's tomorrow and Friday and normally the decision will be given within a week or so then the actual case can take years and I don't think that's what South Africa's interested in they're interested in trying to get an order to stop Israel fighting because it's harming Hamas and they're allying in this case with Hamas so the first stage will be to try and get an interim order against Israel to cease fighting and the actual case I think will be years ahead do we know what kind of proof South Africa will present to make this case yes they'll quote the statements by Israeli politicians and they'll say look so many civilians have been killed that's proof that it was an attempt to genocide and of course the answer would be we made every effort to raise the civilian casualties and Hamas was interested in they put their arms, their rockets next to civilians civilian buildings in mosques next to hospitals in order to increase civilian casualties to be able to prove that that's what Israel's doing this will be the crux of the discussion of the dispute between them and the court and again how the judges will decide the judges are not impartial I don't know now you know briefly just so that the public understands why is South Africa taking the lead on this to begin with why is it within their interest do you think is this a moral obligation they feel in light of their own history I think it's a combination of two they want to prove they're anti-west and they say Israel is a bastion of the western world they want to carry favor with the Arab states the background of fact that the PLO supported the anti-apartheid regime and they feel a moral duty to support the Palestinians so it's a combination of the two they want to help the Palestinians but to prove that South Africa is leading the third world against the west so I think it's a combination of these two elements now do we know what steps the court can take until the final ruling can they give a warrant to Israel to stop its hostilities so-called hostilities its operations I don't know what they do South Africa wants them to issue an order to Israel to stop fighting and what the court will do we don't know but that's the request of South Africa that Israel should be ordered to stop fighting and therefore save the Hamas leadership which apparently South Africa wants to do and do we know that the Hamas atrocities will they be presented in this court case we will present again and as far as I know we'll even present in a film filmed by the Hamas people themselves showing that they went out to murder and to rape and to destroy we will be showing this it's part of the element that Israel act in self-defense we didn't attack Hamas and that's something the world seems to be ignoring when it attacks we do defend ourselves and this is certainly one of the most documented atrocities that is out there and can be proven and by Hamas operatives themselves Hamas terrorists thank you very much Robby Sable thank you that's all for this edition of i24 news we have rolling coverage providing you with the latest from Israel we'll be back at the top of the hour for more news and updates follow us on our website i24news.tv and across our social media platforms I'm Siobhan Ravi, thank you for watching Art Luther King's famous 1968 mountaintop speech was based on his trip to the promised land well now, 55 years later his prophetic words are coming true hundreds of African American women took a journey of a lifetime to the holy land we'll introduce you to the amazing female spiritual religious leaders who are infusing new energy into the next generation of African Americans welcome to i24 news I'm Siobhan Ravi and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv today is day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues the IDF announced the 24-year-old Sergeant 1st Class in Reserves Elkanan Nulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the central Gaza Strip he was a combat medic in the 99th division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas a senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hussain Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel including a recent strike on an IDF base was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday despite international efforts to prevent escalation crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza discussing the phased transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation We know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians who hides in and fires from schools, from hospitals makes this incredibly challenging but the daily toll on civilians in Gaza particularly on children is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza and as the IDF scales down its forces there we agreed to down a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission it will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north now this is not going to happen overnight there are serious security infrastructure and humanitarian challenges but the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome and joining us now from Israel's southern border from Shalom crossing is our I-24 news correspondent Pierre Kloschendler Pierre, what is the situation on the ground? Well, there's been per the IDF 150 strikes overnight on presumed targets in the area of the Almorazi refugee camp in the central sector of the Gaza Strip as well as down south in the city of Hanyunes where the army is deepening its offensive, its ground offensive and actually we've heard earlier around further north from where we are sporadic artillery bombardment probably in support of the ground forces Now Pierre, according to Lebanese media Israel seems to believe that Hamas might think of smuggling its leaders and or the Israeli hostages outside of Gaza and to other places in the region how feasible is this? Well, it's feasible because the Gaza Strip of land 13 kilometers long which is called the Philadelphia Corridor between Gaza and the Egyptian territory just in this direction and that Strip of land has been used for the past 16 years since Hamas is in charge of the Gaza Strip after the coup that it conducted against Fatah in 2007 it managed to dig tunnels underneath the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip tunnels that could bring ammunition, even cars even people and the fear of the establishment of the Israeli establishment is that these tunnels are still intact and could be used by the political and military leadership of Hamas to leave the Gaza Strip with the hostages to go inside Egypt and move from Egypt to bordering countries such as Sudan and Libya and eventually be moved to Lebanon or Iran and therefore there are special units of intelligence in the IDF operating in the Sinai Peninsula as well as Libya and Sudan according to two Arab media the Qatari-based newspaper and Al-Aqbah, a Lebanese-based newspaper close to Hezbollah Pierre Kloschendler, thank you very much Joining us now in studio is Military and Strategic Affairs Analyst at the Jewish News Syndicate and Research Fellow at the Alma Center, Yaakov Lapin Thank you for coming in Yaakov, we're hearing what Pierre is talking about according to Lebanese media Israeli special forces are possibly operating in some of these other countries in the region in order to check or to make sure that the Israeli hostages and the Hamas leaders won't be smuggled out of the Gaza Strip how likely is it to happen? I would take some of these reports with a grain of salt, of course Israel will have to work with Egypt which has security control of the Sinai Peninsula to make sure that people whether it's senior terrorists or terrorists with hostages will have to flee the Gaza Strip Sinai Peninsula is a vast area it's under Egyptian security control there are satellites in space there are all kinds of ways of monitoring movements in that area the idea that they'll be able to do this without being picked up by the Egyptians first and foremost is remote I think that it's obvious that the security establishment will keep an eye out and work with the Egyptians to make sure that this isn't happening but beyond that I wouldn't attribute much more weight than that to this issue Now let's talk about the Gazans there is serious talk about Gazans going back to the north residents of the north going back home but we know that there are not many homes to go back to how realistic is this? The idea that's being floated by the United Nations and others is that some sort of temporary accommodations would be set up for them in these northern neighborhoods and eventually that's probably what's going to happen now purely from an operational perspective it's too soon to do this there are still battles raging in northern Gaza even if it's just against unorganized terror cells they're there, they're firing on the IDF the IDF is firing back, we're seeing battles every day and every night so for them to come back now would be to place them in harm's way and just for that reason alone that's enough of a reason for them not to go back into northern Gaza now this would have to wait until the later stage in the war this will be very difficult to achieve during war that's essentially what you're saying Exactly, I mean the idea of letting civilians who evacuated Gaza city, northern Gaza and the IDF worked so hard to evacuate them to just throw them back in harm's way it doesn't make any sense from an operational perspective and from a humanitarian perspective they would get in the way of the military they would again be used as human shields Northern Gaza is not yet ready for that kind of development it's going to take I think much more time and they're better off, these people are better off in the humanitarian zone in al-Mawazi and the Rafah area where they have access to food they have access to medicine, they have access to water and all these supply lines are moving the trucks are coming in even if Hamas is stealing a chunk of that but they're obviously going to be better and safer there than they would be in northern Gaza right now and yet there is a lot of international pressure for this to to be done now keeping them in the south is also tricky though because there is still a lot to be to be taken care of in the south sure, but the things that remain to be taken care of are much more solvable there than they are anywhere else in the Gaza Strip everything is relative here but if the pressure is on to get more humanitarian trucks and we've had over 7000 of these trucks since the beginning of the war going into Gaza carrying tens of thousands of humanitarian aid of every imaginable kind whether it's medicine, whether it's food whether it's shelter equipment, it's all flowing in and the IDF and Israel will keep opening more and more ways and avenues to speed up that process then we have bottlenecks in Gaza itself because the UN is struggling to process this amount of trucks and then they shift the blame black onto Israel which is quite convenient for them to do so we have this blame game but ultimately Israel is very much in favor of allowing as many humanitarian trucks into Gaza as the UN can process and the Philadelphia corridor why is that a sort of conflict the Philadelphia corridor is going to have to be sealed at some point and there are different ways of doing this the thing is that if this war ends without the Philadelphia corridor being sealed Hamas will try to again resume its smuggling of Iranian provided weapons from the Sinai Peninsula and even if we have the most cooperative Egyptian security forces on the other side there's no such thing as a hermetic blocking off of all the tunnels there are smuggling tunnels that likely remain active there some kind of underground barrier is going to have to be built there they're going to have to be sensors over land so in order for all of this to happen there has to be some kind of change on the Philadelphia corridor otherwise Gaza will once again be flooded with weapons okay let's talk about the northern border okay there's crossfire between Israel and Hezbollah going on for a very long time there were targeted killings in Lebanon Hezbollah operatives it's probably the first time that Israel has actually admitted to this targeted killing why the change usually Israel does not admit to these kind of targeted killings or assassinations it's always allegedly right so the alleged stuff is you know a sort of familiar pattern that the Israeli defense establishment kind of clings onto from the days of the shadow war in Syria when it gave enemies a sort of space of deniability and that would take the pressure off them to respond the less embarrassed they are the less they feel the need to respond but in this context I think you know everybody's realizing it's kind of irrelevant everybody knows who's behind these assassinations the minute Hezbollah comes out and points at Israel as you know the perpetrator of the assassination what's the point of denying it anyway and also you know the Israeli defense establishment has to present achievements to the Israeli people regarding this low intensity war that's underway right now with Hezbollah so it's you know I think we're seeing these patterns from the shadow war in Syria kind of being ditched now and that's why I think we're seeing this claim of responsibility by Israel as part of a much broader escalation that's underway with Hezbollah a very worrisome Khan media report we see that Israeli hospitals are reportedly asked to be prepared to receive thousands of victims and injuries and especially the hospitals of the north are expected to be ready to be isolated for several days without receiving new medical equipment that how realistic is it that this is actually a scenario that will pan out so I'll say two things about that first of all to put this in its proper proportion Israeli hospitals have been working with the IDF home front command to drill these scenarios for years so the protocol of drilling it is not new and they have to be ready for that kind of scenario because at any time we could have entered into a full-scale war situation with Hezbollah the timing is of course relevant because we are facing continuous exchanges of fire with Hezbollah and the scenario of this escalating into a much larger conflict is very much on the table it's possible so we don't know what the breaking point is we have to be honest and say we don't know when that moment will come when we're going from low intensity to high intensity when it's dozens of rockets or drones to thousands Hezbollah can hit northern Israel with 10,000 rockets a day in a full-scale war situation it can hit central Israel with at least a thousand rockets a day in a full-scale war situation we don't know when or if that moment will come and it's absolutely the duty of hospitals and emergency responders and the idea of home front command to make sure that if it does come that they're ready so you know this isn't a prediction of this happening but it's ensuring readiness for the scenario of it happening Thank you very much Joining us now is founder of Inside the Middle East Institute and Middle East expert Hi Avi, thank you for joining us here Of course, thank you, good morning Good morning, now Avi, we see that there is normalization talks between the Saudis and Israel which are still ongoing these normalization talks began before October 7th and are apparently still on the table Yes, that is correct they never went away actually Look, I think we have to put it in a larger regional picture. In the end of the day we are looking at the Middle East that is going through a major transforming phase and one of the major issues that today dictates the day and the upcoming Middle East, the geo-strategic features of the landscape of the Middle East is the story of the Iranian regime its hegemonic vision, its aggression across the region as well as the need of major Arab players in stability and particularly when we are talking about Saudi Arabia who is going through an enormous transitional phase. It is not secret that the Saudis are looking for relationship with Israel because they view Israel as a very important strategic partner. One of the outcome of the story of the war right now was that Hamas one of the major reasons Hamas was actually launching that war that Hamas was trying by doing that to basically block the process of Israeli Saudi rapprochement it seems like that actually what's going to happen is the opposite outcome. It seems like that in fact the Israeli Saudi rapprochement is likely to be boosted and speed up as one of the outcome of that of that war. So I think that it's not really surprising to see that and to hear that actually the Saudis are saying openly we are serious about moving on with the whole process of rapprochement with Israel. So it does sound like they're serious Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the UK is saying that it is interested in normalizing relations with Israel after the war in Gaza but that any deal must lead to the creation of a Palestinian state. How likely is that to happen? I don't know how likely is that to happen. We have to remember that Muhammad bin Salman shortly before the war by the way that was one of the pivotal moment that apparently was fueling Hamas decision to do what he did to launch the war against Israel. Someone was interviewed to Fox News and that was a very interesting interview because he said nothing about the whole basic demands of the Palestinians including nothing about two state solution. Now the Saudis are making different tune in that regard but we have to be very clear about it. The Saudis shed no tear when they see Hamas crush down. We have to remember the Saudis themselves imprisoned Hamas people in Saudi Arabia for long period of time and they didn't treat them with honey and the Saudis wants to see Hamas weakened. Hamas is not going to disappear but the whole idea is in the end of the day that Hamas who views itself as a regional player and up until October 7 to large extent was playing such a role the Saudis would like to see Hamas wings cut off. The Saudis like many other by the way Arab players in the region like the Egyptians and the Jordanians and the Emirates would like to see Hamas shrink to its normal size and becoming an irrelevant player in the context of like able to continue and to dictate Hamas as well as Iran's radical agenda. So for the Saudis in the end of the day when they are talking about the day post the war yes they are coming with the mantra of the two state and a Palestinian state and on and on but in the end of the day the whole discussion is going to be quite different once Hamas will not be any longer able to play the same role he was playing before October 7 so I wouldn't take too much seriously the Saudis announcement about one state Palestinian state or two state and so on and so on. In the end of the day what will happen on the ground following the war assuming and hoping that Hamas will become an irrelevant player that will be decided based upon the phase post the war and I wouldn't take so much seriously right now the Saudis statements about Palestinian state. They do mention the deplorable casualty figures in Gaza and that they are not going to normalize at the expense or the cost of the Palestinian people. Now we see that Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the UK also is criticizing the current Israeli government they he says quote the problem that we have today with the current government in Israel is that there is an extreme absolutist perspective which does not work to achieve compromise and therefore you're never going to end the conflict. This is direct criticism of Netanyahu's government. Yes of course and it's there it's been there all the time the Saudis all the time have been repeating this rhetoric of like you know criticizing the Israeli government of course you would expect the Saudis also at this point to criticize Israel and particularly when we see what's going on right now in Gaza street. But again in the end of the day when we look at the large picture we have to remember we are looking at the large players in the region that have a long term geo-strategic interest in the end of the day the Saudis know the Israeli government know that in the end of the day when the Americans are stepping in and they are stepping in that's part of blink and visit to the region right now there is in the end of the day the need to generate a momentum towards the next phase of building the Israeli Saudi reprosment and the Israeli Saudi normalization process it's inevitable almost I would say particularly when you see for example the the way that the Houthis the Saudis neighbor are basically terrorizing the whole area of the Gulf the Red Sea and the Babelman substrate they are sitting on the Saudis backyard the Saudis are enormously concerned with that so in the end of the day what will really make the decision was not the composition of an Israeli government neither the statements of Palestinian leaders or whatever but in the end of the day the long-term geostrategic interest of the players involved and those long-term strategic interest in the end of the day are much bigger than both the composition of the Israeli government as well as the story of the Palestinians you mentioned the Houthis and according to the Pentagon 18 drones two anti-ship cruise missiles and one anti-ship ballistic missile were launched by the Houthis all shut down overnight in the Red Sea now they've attacked 26 times since November and the international coalition warned last week that they will be held responsible for these kind of attacks should we be seeing or expecting the international community to respond now as of now and I must be very clear about it I am concerned that what we are viewing right now in this arena of the Red Sea is a replay of the story that happened to Obama's administration back in the war in Syria I remind you that back in the war in Syria Obama's administration drew a line in the sand vis-a-vis the whole story of the use of chemical weapon we all remember how it end up it end up with the fact that the United States basically evaporate that demand and what we know happened following that was that for a short period of time there was some sort of like an agreement vis-a-vis the chemical weapon in Syria and later on Assad again reuse chemical weapon against its people in Syria I say what we are looking at the Red Sea could be something very similar and it's very disturbing it's very turbulent because if the United States of America and the coalition basically say final warning to the Houthis and the Houthis clearly are not impressed with that that brings the United States of America and its allies to a junction are they are going to stand beyond the ultimatum or beyond the warning or they are not with all the discussions that comes along with that thank you very much for speaking to us thank you good morning Israelis are highlighting the plight of the hostages who have been in captivity in Gaza since the Hamas rampage and abduction on October 7th however there is a lesser known Ethiopian Israeli hostage who has been in the hands of Hamas since 2014 Avram in Gisto for several years now an Ethiopian artist has dedicated her life to painting in Gisto and is visiting hostage square regularly to make sure his name is never forgotten more from our Emily Francis I was born in Ethiopia and was brought here during Operation Moses I arrived when I was two years old artist Michal Warka has had a passion for painting her entire life I think that I started to paint from when I was nine years old it was something that occupied my mind and brought me quiet one of only 170,000 Ethiopian Jews living in Israel Michal turned her paint brush into a purpose bigger than herself I started to paint Avira in 2017 during the years I thought about him a lot now I'm thinking about him and his family even more after October 7th Avira occupies my mind all the time in 2014 after his brother died a grieving Avira Mangisto crossed into northern Gaza on his own and was later taken hostage by Hamas terrorists I am the captive Avira Mangisto how much longer will I have to be here in captivity me and my friends last year Hamas released this video of a mumbling Mangisto who is one of two Israeli hostages held by Hamas since 2014 along with the remains of two IDF soldiers who were killed My family and I decided to be patient to allow the Israeli government to give the time to work to bring my brother home I think that Avira is interesting also in a visual way many years have passed since he was kidnapped we can see a difference between the pictures of him his face changes also his mother and father and trust me we can see their changes we can see their mental state just by looking at their faces because it's like getting inside their pain since October 7th Michal has gone several times a week to hostage square to raise awareness that Avira has been in Hamas captivity since 2014 and even though there are a few posters of Avira where Michal is saddened that the government of Israel has not done enough to bring him home I think there's something racist here I see the way they treat Avira it's not something that I'm not familiar with I know how the authorities treat Ethiopian Jews but I don't want to concentrate on this I think his life is the most important thing now this is the most important thing later we'll discuss racism Michal who traveled to Ethiopia and South Africa to gain inspiration fine tuned her use of color and realism and spends as long as a month on her bigger paintings and she shares her work on her Instagram page but until the hostages come home Michal will continue to give a voice to Avira and hopes to have an exhibition of her work I didn't know if they knew about it and I know that they know that many people care about him it's important that they'll know that people care about him and say his name Emily Francis, I-24 News Avira Mangisto still in captivity after all these years in our recap of the headlines from this past hour the IDF announced the 24-year-old sergeant first class in reserves in Kananulander from Efrat was killed fighting yesterday in the Central Gaza Strip he was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas a senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hussein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel including a recent strike on an IDF base was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday despite international efforts to prevent escalation crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon that's all for this edition of I-24 News we have rolling coverage providing you with the latest from Israel we'll be back on top of the hour for more news and updates be sure to follow us on our website i-24news.tv and across our social media platforms I'm Sivana Raviv, thank you for watching 24 News I'm Sivana Raviv and these are the latest developments coming to you live from Tel Aviv today is day 96 of Israel's war with Hamas as the fighting continues the IDF announced the 24-year-old sergeant first class in reserves Elkanan Nulander was killed fighting yesterday in the central Gaza Strip he was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas a senior Hezbollah commander Ali Hussein Burji responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel a recent strike on an IDF base was killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon yesterday despite international efforts to prevent escalation crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited Israel once again during his shuttle diplomacy trip to the Middle East this week and addressed the humanitarian crisis in Gaza discussing the phased transition of Israel's military campaign and the efforts to prevent further conflict Blinken met with Israeli hostage families and also expressed concern about the International Court of Justice submission against Israel rejecting the charge of genocide Blinken highlighted discussions with regional leaders and their commitment to preventing conflict escalation take a listen we know that facing an enemy that embeds itself among civilians who hides in and fires from schools from hospitals makes this incredibly challenging but the daily toll on civilians in Gaza particularly on children is far too high as Israel's campaign moves to a lower intensity phase in northern Gaza and as the IDF scales down its forces there we agreed today on a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission it will determine what needs to be done to allow displace Palestinians to return safely to homes in the north now this is not going to happen overnight there are serious security infrastructure and humanitarian challenges but the mission will start a process that evaluates these obstacles and how they can be overcome and joining us now from Israel's southern border from the Karim Shalom crossing is our I-24 news correspondent Pierre Kloschendler Pierre what is the situation on the ground well there's been per the IDF 150 strikes of a night on presumed terror targets in the area of the Almorazi refugee camp in the central sector of the Gaza Strip as well as down south in the city of Hanyunes where the army is deepening its offensive, its ground offensive and actually we've heard earlier on further north from where we are sporadic artillery bombardment probably in support of the ground forces now Pierre according to Lebanese media Israel seems to believe that Hamas might think of smuggling its leaders and or the Israeli hostages outside of Gaza and to other places in the region how feasible is this? well it's feasible because there is a narrow strip of land 13 kilometer long which is called the Philadelphia Corridor between Gaza and the Egyptian territory just in this direction and that strip of land has been used for the past 16 years since Hamas is in charge of the Gaza Strip after the coup that it conducted against Fatah in 2007 it managed to dig tunnels underneath the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip tunnels that could bring ammunition, even cars even people and the fear of the establishment of the Israeli establishment is that these tunnels are still intact and could be used by the political and military leadership of Hamas to leave the Gaza Strip with the hostages go inside Egypt and move from Egypt to bordering countries such as Sudan and Libya and eventually be moved to Lebanon and therefore there are special units of intelligence in the IDF operating in the Sinai Peninsula as well as Libya and Sudan according to two Arab media the Qatari-based newspaper and Al-Aqbah a Lebanese-based newspaper close to Hezbollah Joining us now in studio is Military and Strategic Affairs Analyst Jewish News Syndicate and Research Fellow at the Alma Center Thank you for coming in We're hearing what Pierre is talking about according to Lebanese media Israeli special forces are possibly operating in some of these other countries in the region in order to check or to make sure that the Israeli hostages and the Hamas leaders won't be smuggled out of the Gaza Strip How likely is it to happen? I would take some of these reports with a grain of salt. Of course Israel will have to work with Egypt which has security control of the Sinai Peninsula to make sure that people, whether it's senior terrorists or terrorists with hostages are not trying to flee the Gaza Strip the Sinai Peninsula is a vast area it's under Egyptian security control there are satellites in space there are all kinds of ways of monitoring movements in that area the idea that they'll be able to do this so that being picked up by the Egyptians first and foremost is remote I think that it's obvious that the security establishment will keep an eye out and work with the Egyptians to make sure that this isn't happening but beyond that I wouldn't attribute much more weight than that to this issue I see. Now let's talk about the Gazans. There is serious talk about Gazans going back to the north, residents of the north going back home but we know that there are not many homes to go back to how realistic is this? So the idea that Siano being floated by the United Nations and others is that some sort of temporary accommodations would be set up for them in these northern neighborhoods and eventually that's probably what's going to happen but right now purely from an operational perspective it's too soon to do this there are still battles raging in northern Gaza even if it's just against unorganized terror cells they're there, they're firing on the IDF the IDF is firing back, we're seeing battles every day and every night so for them to come back now would be to place them in harm's way and just for that reason alone that's enough of a reason for them not to go back into northern Gaza now this would have to wait until the later stage in the war. Now we know that this it will be very difficult to achieve during war that's essentially what you're saying. Exactly I mean the idea of letting civilians who evacuated Gaza city northern Gaza and the IDF worked so hard to evacuate them to just throw them back in harm's way it doesn't make any sense from an operational perspective and from a humanitarian perspective they would get in the way of the military they would again be used as human shields northern Gaza is not yet ready for that kind of development it's going to take I think much more time and they're better off these people are better off in the humanitarian zone in Al Mawazi and the Rafah area where they have access to food they have access to medicine water and all these supply lines are moving the trucks are coming in even if Hamas is stealing a chunk of that but they're obviously going to be better and safer there than they would be in northern Gaza right now. And yet there is a lot of international pressure for this to be done. Now keeping them in the south is also tricky though because there's still a lot to be taken care of in the south. Sure but the things that remain to be taken care of are much more solvable there than they are anywhere else in the Gaza Strip you know everything is relative here but if the pressure is on to get more humanitarian trucks and we've had over 7000 of these trucks since the beginning of the war going into Gaza carrying tens of thousands of humanitarian aid of every imaginable kind whether it's medicine whether it's food whether it's shelter equipment it's all flowing in and the IDF and Israel will keep opening more and more ways and avenues to speed up that process then we have the bottlenecks in Gaza itself because the UN is struggling to process this amount of trucks and then they shift the blame black onto Israel which is quite convenient for them to do so we have this blame game but ultimately Israel is very much in favor of allowing as many humanitarian trucks into Gaza as the UN can process. And the Philadelphia corridor why is that a source of conflict? The Philadelphia corridor is going to have to be sealed at some point and there are different ways of doing this. The thing is that if this war ends without the Philadelphia corridor being sealed Hamas will try to again resume its smuggling of Iranian provided weapons from the Sinai Peninsula and even if we have the most cooperative Egyptian security forces on the other side there's no such thing as a hermetic blocking off of all the tunnels there are smuggling tunnels that likely remain active there are some kind of underground barriers going to have to be built there there are going to have to be sensors over land so in order for all of this to happen there has to be some kind of change on the Philadelphia corridor otherwise Gaza will once again be flooded with weapons. Let's talk about the northern border. There is crossfire between Israel and Hezbollah going on for a very long time there were targeted killings in Lebanon of Hezbollah operatives it's probably the first time Israel has actually admitted to this targeted killing why the change usually Israel does not admit to these kind of targeted killings or assassinations it's always allegedly right so the alleged stuff is you know a sort of old pattern familiar pattern that the Israeli defense establishment kind of clings onto from the days of the shadow war in Syria when it gave enemies a sort of space of deniability and that would take the pressure off them to respond the less embarrassed they are the less they feel the need to respond but in this context I think everybody's realizing it's kind of irrelevant everybody knows who's behind these assassinations the minute Hezbollah comes out and points at Israel as the perpetrator of the assassination what's the point of denying it anyway and also the Israeli defense establishment has to present achievements to the Israeli people regarding this low intensity war that's underway right now with Hezbollah so it's I think we're seeing these patterns from the shadow war in Syria kind of being ditched now and that's why I think we're seeing this claim of responsibility by Israel as part of a much broader escalation that's underway with Hezbollah. Now in a very worrisome Khan media report we see that Israeli hospitals are reportedly asked to be prepared to receive thousands of victims and injuries and especially the hospitals of the north are expected to be ready to be isolated for several days without receiving new medical equipment that how realistic is it that this is actually a scenario that will pan out so I'll say two things about that first of all to put this in it's proper proportion Israeli hospitals have been working with the IDF home front command to drill these scenarios for years so the protocol of drilling it is not new and they have to be ready for that kind of scenario because at any time we could have entered into a full-scale war situation with Hezbollah the timing is of course relevant because we are facing continuous exchanges of fire with Hezbollah and the scenario of this escalating into a much larger conflict is very much on the table it's possible so we don't know what the breaking point is okay we have to be honest and say we don't know when that moment will come when we're going from low intensity to high intensity when it's dozens of rockets or drones to thousands Hezbollah can hit northern Israel with 10,000 rockets a day in a full-scale war situation it can hit central Israel with at least a thousand rockets a day in a full-scale war situation we don't know when or if that moment will come and it's absolutely the duty of hospitals and emergency responders and the IDF home front command to make sure that if it does come that they're ready so this isn't a prediction of this happening but it's ensuring readiness for the scenario of it happening. Thank you very much. Joining us now is founder of Inside the Middle East Institute and Middle East expert Avi Milamed. Hi Avi, thank you for joining us here. Of course, thank you, good morning. Good morning. Now Avi we see that there is normalization talks between the Saudis and Israel which are still ongoing. These normalization talks began before October 7th and are apparently still on the table. Yes, that is correct they never went away actually. Look, I think we have to put it in a larger regional picture. In the end of the day we are looking at the Middle East that is going through a major transforming phase and one of the major issues that today dictates the day and the upcoming Middle East, the geostrategic features of the landscape of the Middle East is the story of the Iranian regime its hegemonic vision, its aggression across the region, as well as the need of major Arab players instability and particularly when we are talking about Saudi Arabia who is going through an enormous transitional phase. It is not secret that the Saudis are looking for relationship with Israel because they view Israel as a very important strategic partner. One of the outcome of the story of the war right now was that Hamas one of the major reasons Hamas was actually launching that war that Hamas was trying by doing that to basically block the process of Israeli Saudi rapprochement but it seems like that actually what is going to happen is the opposite outcome it seems like that in fact the Israeli Saudi rapprochement is likely to be boosted and speed up as one of the outcome of that war. So I think that it is not very surprising to see that and to hear that actually the Saudis are saying openly we are serious about moving on with the whole process of rapprochement with Israel. So it does sound like they're serious Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the UK is saying that it is interested in normalizing relations with Israel after the war in Gaza but that any deal must lead to the creation of a Palestinian state. How likely is that to happen? I don't know how likely is that to happen. We have to remember that Muhammad bin Salman shortly before the war by the way that was one of the pivotal moment that apparently was fueling Hamas decision to do what he did to launch the war against Israel. Muhammad bin Salman was interviewed to Fox News and it was a very interesting interview because he said nothing about the whole basic demands of the Palestinians including nothing about two state solution. Now the Saudis are making a different tune in that regard but we have to be very clear about it. The Saudis shed no tear when they see Hamas crush down. We have to remember the Saudis themselves imprisoned Hamas people in Saudi Arabia for long period of time and they didn't treat them with honey and the Saudis wants to see Hamas weakened. Hamas is not going to disappear but the whole idea here is in the end of the day that Hamas who views itself as a regional player and up until October 7 to a large extent was playing such a role. The Saudis would like to see Hamas wings cut off the Saudis like many other by the way are our players in the region like the Egyptians and the Jordanians and the Emirates would like to see Hamas shrink to its normal size and becoming an irrelevant player in the context of like able to continue and to dictate Hamas as well as Iran's radical agenda. So for the Saudis in the end of the day when they are talking about the day post the war yes they are coming with the mantra of the two state and a Palestinian state and on and on but in the end of the day the whole discussion is going to be quite different once Hamas will not be any longer able to play the same role he was playing before October 7th. So I wouldn't take too much seriously the Saudis announcement about one state, a Palestinian state or two state and so on and so on in the end of the day what will happen on the ground following the war assuming and hoping that Hamas will become an irrelevant player that will be decided based upon the phase post the war and I wouldn't take so much seriously right now the Saudis statements about Palestinian state. They do mention the deplorable casualty figures in Gaza and that they're not going to normalize at the expense or the cost of the Palestinian people. Now we see that Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the UK also is criticizing the current Israeli government they he says quote the problem that we have today with the current government in Israel is that there is an extreme absolutist perspective which does not work to achieve compromise and therefore you're never going to end the conflict. This is direct criticism of Netanyahu's government. Yes of course and it's there it's been there all the time the Saudis all the time have been repeating this rhetoric of like you know criticizing the Israeli government of course you would expect the Saudis also at this point to criticize Israel and particularly when we see what's going on right now in Gaza but again in the end of the day when we look at the large picture we have to remember we are looking at the large players in the region that have a long term geostrategic interest in the end of the day the Saudis know the Israeli government know that in the end of the day when the Americans are stepping in and they are stepping in that's part of blink and visit to the region right now there is in the end of the day the need to generate a momentum towards the next phase of building the Israeli Saudi repressment and the Israeli Saudi normalization process it's inevitable almost I would say particularly when you see for example the way that the Saudis neighbor are basically terrorizing the whole area of the Red Sea and the Babelmandab they are sitting on the Saudis backyard the Saudis are enormously concerned with that so in the end of the day what will really make the decision was not the composition of an Israeli government neither the statements of Palestinian leaders or whatever but in the end of the day the long term geostrategic interest of the players involved and those long term strategic interest in the end of the day are much bigger than both the composition of the Israeli government as well as of the Palestinians you mentioned the Houthis and according to the Pentagon 18 drones two anti-ship cruise missiles and one anti-ship ballistic missile were launched by the Houthis all shut down overnight in the Red Sea now they've attacked 26 times since November and the international coalition warned last week that they will be held responsible for these kind of attacks should we be seeing or expecting the international community to respond now look as of now and I must be very clear about it I am concerned at what we are viewing right now in this arena of the Red Sea is a replay of the story that happened to Obama's administration back in the war in Syria I remind you that back in the war in Syria Obama's administration drew a line in the sand vis-à-vis the whole story of the use of chemical weapon we all remember how it end up it end up with the fact that the United States basically evaporated that demand and what we know happened following that was that for a short period of time there was some sort of like an agreement vis-à-vis the chemical weapon in Syria and later on Assad once again re-use chemical weapon against its people in Syria I say what we are looking at the Red Sea could be something very similar and it's very disturbing it's very turbulent because if the United States of America and the coalition basically say final warning to the Houthis and the Houthis clearly are not impressed with that that brings the United States of America and its allies to a junction how they are going to stand beyond the ultimatum or beyond the warning or they are not with all the ramifications that comes along with that Thank you very much for speaking to us Thank you good morning Israelis are highlighting the plight of the hostages who have been in captivity in Gaza since the Hamas rampage and abduction on October 7th however there is a lesser known Ethiopian Israeli hostage who has been in the hands of Hamas since 2014 Avra Mengisto for several years now an Ethiopian artist has dedicated her life to painting Mengisto and is visiting hostage square regularly to make sure his name is never forgotten more from our Emily Francis from Ethiopia and was brought here during Operation Moses I arrived when I was two years old artist Michal Warka has had a passion for painting her entire life I think that I started to paint from when I was nine years old it was something that occupied my mind and brought me quiet one of only 170,000 Ethiopian Jews living in Israel Michal turned her paint brush into a purpose bigger than herself I started to paint Avira in 2017 during the years I thought about him a lot now I'm thinking about him and his family even more after October 7th Avira occupies my mind all the time in 2014 after his brother died a grieving Avira Mengisto crossed into northern Gaza on his own and was later taken hostage by Hamas terrorists I am the captive Avira Mengisto how much longer will I have to be here in captivity, me and my friends last year Hamas released this video of a mumbling Mengisto who is one of two Israeli hostages held by Hamas since 2014 along with the remains of two IDF soldiers who were killed my family and I decided to be patient to allow the Israeli government to give the time to work to bring my brother home I think that Avira is interesting also in a visual way many years have passed since he was kidnapped so we can see a difference between the pictures of him his face changes also his mother and father interest me we can see their changes we can see their mental state just by looking at their faces because it's like getting inside their pain since October 7th I think when you look at this there are times a week to hostage square to raise awareness that Avira has been in Hamas captivity since 2014 and even though there are a few posters of Avira in hostage square Michal is saddened that the government of Israel has not done enough to bring him home I think there's something racist here I see the way they treat Avira But I don't want to concentrate on this. I think his life is the most important thing. Now this is the most important thing. Later we'll discuss racism. Michal, who traveled to Ethiopia and South Africa to gain inspiration, fine-tuned her use of color and realism and spends as long as a month on her bigger paintings and she shares her work on her Instagram page. But until the hostages come home, Michal will continue to give a voice to Avira and hopes to have an exhibition of her work. I didn't know if they knew about it and I know that they know that many people care about him. It's important that they'll know that people care about him and say his name. Emily Francis, I-24 News. Avira Mangisto is still in captivity after all these years. In our recap of the headlines from this past hour, the IDF announced the 24-year-old sergeant first class in reserves in Kananulander from Ifat was killed fighting yesterday in the Central Gaza Strip. He was a combat medic in the 99th Division and is the 186th soldier to be killed in the ground offensive against Hamas. A senior Hezbollah commander, Ali Hossein Burji, responsible for numerous explosive drone attacks on northern Israel, including a recent strike on an IDF base, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon yesterday. Despite international efforts to prevent escalation, Crossfire continues across Israel's northern border with Lebanon. That's all for this edition of I-24 News. We have rolling coverage providing you with the latest from Israel. We'll be back at the top of the hour for more news and updates. Be sure to follow us on our website, i-24news.tv and across our social media platforms. I'm Sivan Raveeth. Thank you for watching. Is in a state of war, families completely gunned down in their beds. We have no idea where is she. As our soldiers are fighting on the front line, but the general perception is something that certainly needs to be fought as well. Anti-Israel protests going on all around the world, it can all feel pretty hopeless. So it is reassuring that Israel's good friends are showing up to lend support. Among them the American actor and comedian Michael Rafferfor. He's been here almost two weeks and he does seem very much at home. In this place and to know the story and to hear the story and you know we've seen so much on social media and on the news but when you're actually in here and you know that people were hiding in these safe rooms which are for bombs while I'm hearing explosions and this is like takes your fucking breath away and to just know like the horror and the fear that these are like regular regular Joe Schmo regular people hiding for their lives in this whole little neighborhood. Like this is like a small little like the only thing I could compare is like something like Northern California neighborhood or upstate New York type of neighborhood to be just terrorized by motherfuckers who came in here with the intent to kill. And I'm delighted to say Michael is with me in the studio now. Welcome, thank you for being with us. Glad to be here and I appreciate you having me and you know I told you I watched the channel. That's good to hear, that's great to hear. We just saw footage of you there visiting the carnage in Kibbutz Berry. You've been visiting the Kibbutz. You've also been with the families of some of the hostages. It seems as though this atrocity has really affected you personally. Is that right? It has affected me personally the entire situation, the massacre the the fact that it's 75 days and there's still so many hostages and there's so many people dealing with the heartbreak of what's already happened the soldiers that are fighting and the soldiers that are going down and just the whole the whole incident and all the aftermath of it is upsetting and of course to me it's a separate situation but the the sort of anti the anti-Jewish sentiment, the anti-Israel sentiment I could just say in my country and in my city is very very upsetting. To ask you about that because you grew up Jewish in New York New York City. Did you ever experience anti-Semitism growing up in New York? How do you feel about the scenes that we're seeing in the city now? I mean in Penn Station yesterday we've seen Jewish businesses being targeted, we've seen people who are visibly Jewish being physically attacked. I mean how has the city changed? Well I never experienced anti-Semitism in my life growing up in New York spending a lot of time in Brooklyn and you know went to high my whole young adult until I was 19 and I never had face-to-face. To be honest with you I really started to hear and see a lot of anti-Semitism on social media. In the last I say nine years blatant anti-Semitism I don't like the anti-Semitism in New York. I don't like Jewish people feeling uncomfortable. I don't like Jewish businesses being harassed and attacked and vandalized. And I don't like the poster-rippers this whole sort of un it was like a it was adding insult to injury the incident itself was one thing and then you're like this unimaginable anti-Jewish sentiment the moment the same day and certainly the 8th October 8th celebrating and you know invigorating and all these words and quotes and these rallies it's been I think a surprise to a lot of people it's very been surprising to me and I don't like it. I'm not comfortable with it. I don't like it. I don't support it and it makes me angry makes me upset. It makes me scared for all Jewish people. I don't like it especially in Manhattan. It's young people isn't it a lot of the time we've just had this poll out the majority of young people see Jews as an oppressive class and a lot of people also saying the best solution to the conflict here would be to just hand the country over to Hamas I mean what's happening to the young people in America they're so uneducated and so misinformed and all the participation trophies that we've been talking about the jokes the Gen Z the interviewing their feelings the bathrooms the pronouns all of that Kanye West all of it has been a stew and now we're eating that stew with the young people it's turned into anti-Jewishness anti-Semitism anti-Israel and it's blatant and it's in the open and only with Jewish people would it be accepted it wouldn't be accepted with black people Chinese people Puerto Rican people Asian people gay, lesbian any other to be openly like that is only with Jewish people kind of a blind spot for progressive politics yeah it is and you know I have my thoughts as to why but only it would only be accepted so openly with Jewish people in Israel well I mean you're a successful comedian let's talk a bit about Hollywood because this issue seems to have kind of divided Hollywood a little bit early on we had this letter 700 artists signed it condemning Hamas very strongly and then there was a bit of a scuffle with the writer's guild wasn't there and they didn't want to condemn Hamas and someone else pointed out you've stood with me too and you stood with Black Lives Matter why can't you stand with Jews the future for Hollywood and do you think a lot of relationships are going to be broken I mean I can't say I can say I think some relationships will be broken I think Hollywood will eventually figure out what makes money at the end of the day you know like it's a business and it's my business and it's a great business it's a flawed business like any other business but they'll figure out what makes money what sells you know they have been sort of pushing agendas and stereotypes of best friends and you know all these kinds of sort of they've been these stereotypical characters for the last four or five years they'll figure out what needs to happen what sells what doesn't sell and you know as far as the support you know people are taking people are paying attention I can say Jewish people in Hollywood are paying attention and people that are on you know that are understand the situation and have spent a little time to educate themselves are paying attention and again you know you can be not agree with the politics of Israel you could not agree with this war you could not agree a bunch of things the anti-Jewishness and the blatant anti-Zionist and the blatant anti-Semitism is when it's not okay that's one of the arguments that people on the progressive side use they say oh we're not anti-Semitic we have nothing against Jews we just don't want Israel to exist it's Zionism that we don't want this is all that fancy slick cute way of you're full of shit we stop saying you're full of shit we stop doing that and this is why we're hearing too many opinions and opinions are great but doesn't mean they're necessarily valid it's bullshit it's fucking bullshit I know you're bleeping this I know you're bleeping I just want to say this I'm only cursing because they're bleeping I know they're bleeping I'm in control of what I'm doing if this was live I wouldn't curse thank you Michael we appreciate it it's difficult to offend our audience you have Ashkenazi heritage right I think your grandparents came from Eastern Europe so obviously they escaped the holocaust no they didn't they would have been targeted of course that generation just two generations ago had to deal with anti-Semitism and now it is back rearing its ugly head again in a different form do you think America is safe for the Jews going forward I think America is safe for the Jews in the big picture do I like what's going on does it make me comfortable no am I conscious of where I'm walking in New York City yes am I aware of my surroundings more since October 7th yes but we're not going anywhere Israel is not going anywhere Jewish people are not going anywhere so am I saying it's the best time to be Jewish in terms of safety in America in New York City but also it's a lot of what we see on the media the clips they're more frightening the clips of people being harassed it sucks it's real but it's not like every single corner we're not at that point we're far from that point and I urge to remind themselves especially in New York and other people that are seeing that we see all these horrible things in the clips and the clips are making all of us crazy in every way shape and form but I could say for New York am I walking comfortably am paying attention but am walking comfortably you're such a strong advocate for Israel I'm surprised to hear that this is your first visit why did you never come here before well I never came here before because I haven't been to a lot of places if you went over my travel my travel of resume it's not very impressive not a big traveler I've never been to London so I'm not a big traveler as far as Israel and there's a lot of places I just I don't know why I don't like flying it's well I'm here in a very unique time and so many people talk about their trips to Israel and their first trips to Israel being this magical thing and although my first trip to Israel this trip to Israel is not like the normal first trip to Israel coming during a war it has been magical beyond belief and I say that seeing everything the heartbreak the devastation seeing the resilience seeing the sparkle that people still have in their eyes seeing the city seeing the pride that people have in Israel even though people are critical seeing the pride that people have in being Jewish seeing the people together all sorts of people and all those things the emotional journey of this trip has been magical I went to the Dead Sea trip I'm not going to the Dead Sea this trip because my wife already made a promise to come back but I'm so glad that I'm here and we've extended our trip twice and I couldn't be just I couldn't be more happy that we came a lot of Jews who come here say they feel like they came home they feel like they're with the family it's like being part of a big family it is like being part of a big family and the Israeli people the people that live here are so warm and so just have a spirit it's like this people it's like a world it's like a sort of a stereotypical thing you hear about these it's apparent as soon as you hit the ground have you been to Jerusalem? I've been to Jerusalem and I just I did some tourist stuff I was at the market during the day I was at the market last night on a Tuesday night and walking around and I was I made a fake re-proposal to my wife just the emotion of that place and the beauty of that place and the history of that place took my breath away that was one of the more positive sort of things from the trip because a lot of what I've seen has been horrible it's been horrible and it's taken my breath away in not a good way it's been horrible to see Kibbutz Berry to be at Kafar Asa and talk to families that are still waiting for their kids their fathers to come home and that's been horrible and heartbreaking and so frustrating Do you feel like it's important what you're doing you're bearing witness you can carry the message you can tell people what happened because there are a lot of people trying to deny that it ever happened at all 150% people are trying to deny what happened is again it's only with Jewish people in Israel only would they even that would come out of their mouth we see a lot of terrible things a destruction in Gaza no one would say this is fake this isn't happening nobody would say that only with Jewish people would you deny what happened 75 days ago and continue to deny it how's your Hebrew horrible next to nothing it's not an easy language I have a couple of words but I don't want to embarrass myself or offend anybody it's next to nothing it's terrible any plans to learn we want to come back and learn 100% I would love that have you been to the north of Israel yet I've been to the north I can't remember the name of the city but I had a great experience hyper further than that and I can't remember it's oh I don't know you got the other fight of course in the north that's concerning very concerning Israel has to fight Israel has to fight and United States has to stand and continue to stand by the US government has stood by Israel I love a lot of what Joe Biden has said I don't love the sort of good cop bad cop of Kamala Harris I don't like it and we see it Kamala we see the good cop bad cop we're not stupid we see the same NYPD blue okay we've seen that routine for years I don't like the squad and their bullshit I haven't liked them to begin with I think they're totally full of shit I like what you know Bernie oh yeah that was unexpected yeah that was unexpected I like what Hillary has said and it's funny say it again and the funny thing is is because Bernie and Hillary talk about Gen X Gen Z they're like they have Bernie and Hillary tattooed on their body and now they're like fuck Bernie and Hillary yeah well we're out of time Michael but you've given a lot of people a lot of comfort coming to see us here in Israel thank you so much I came for people Michael Rappaport thank you thank you so much the lovely Michael Rappaport there now a new initiative is raising awareness of the plight of the 129 hostages who are still being held in Gaza 75 days after the Hamas attacks on Israel a bouquet of yellow flowers has become a new symbol of hope and resilience well with me in the studio Noah Oveni with her yellow bouquet and you're part of this new initiative to kind of bring awareness to the horrible situation of the hostages and of course this is personal for you you've got two good friends who are still being held Ziv and Gali they're twin brothers tell us a bit about them what happened so Ziv and Gali are 26 year old twin brothers who live in Khoraza they've lived their entire lives I've known them from school and Ziv has become the closest friend to me the closest person to me and on October 7th they were both then hostage kidnapped from their homes just innocent civilians to this day we don't know their whereabouts we know they're kidnapped we don't know their health situation and we're very worried about them we're worried about the fact that the Red Cross hasn't visited them any of the hostages are giving them any medical care or any medicine at all and this initiative is a huge part of raising awareness of the fact that there are still to this day 129 people, innocent civilians being held hostage in Gaza some of which are elderly men, women a baby as well people who could be my grandparents my brothers, my sisters and it's been 75 days I'll repeat that number because it is a shocking number it's a shock everybody 75 days that we don't know where our loved ones are and how they're doing and in what situation they are in all we know is that they're held by a terrorist organization and so this initiative of a bouquet of hope of yellow flowers by the Kadar Foundation of culture and education by Dr. Avram Kadar they've so generously donated beautiful yellow flowers that yellow symbolizes the symbol of the hostages and people kept in captivity to raise this awareness and to keep this on the topic of the day that there are still hostages there as we're speaking and every single day every single second their time is running out and it's not just a slogan their time is running out we've heard that from testimonies we know about somewhat of what their conditions are and it's not good to say the least and this initiative is to remind us and to have some hope and to fight for them to come back to us to bring every single one of those 129 people back home Are you worried people are forgetting about them? Yeah, I'm 100% worried about it I am feeling like they're starting to be forgotten now that a ceasefire isn't really on the table and now that most of the children have been released and most of the women in Israel it's still on the topic but I'll say outside in the outdoors world it's not and we've started spreading outdoors last week we also had this initiative other than in Tel Aviv in the hostage square every single Friday 10 to around 12 we also had it in New York and in Florida and we're planning to continue and grow as much as we can so that people will remember every single Friday I come back home with a bouquet of yellow flowers and every single week it stays on my table in my house and they die and then another week comes by another Friday and I come back home with another bouquet of flowers and it's been it is a symbol of hope because I do believe with all my heart we have hope that's all we can really hold on to and I do believe that what we're doing and raising awareness that's what can help to bring them back to us as you say some of the hostages thankfully are back with their families we've been hearing kind of more and more about the conditions they were held in and aside from the the physical horrors, the lack of food the physical violence one theme that keeps you know you keep hearing that one of the worst things was to think that you've been forgotten that no one was trying to get you home that's something really heartbreaking to think about isn't it? 100% and I always try to put myself in their shoes as much as I can and I would want to know that my country and my family and friends are doing everything in their power to bring me back which is what Gallien-Ziv's family is doing and all of the amazing families of the forum of the hostages that's what they're doing their lives have stopped that's all they're doing is trying to bring their loved ones back other than the amazing symbolization of the yellow flowers another thing is that all of the income from the flowers goes directly to the forum of the hostages and missing families so that's another thing it's a horrible situation to be in isn't it because it's so tragic to see the funerals on the news day after day and people burying their sons their brothers, their loved ones so many people were murdered by the terrorists but these people they're still alive there's still hope but people can't move on as you say their families frozen they can't move on with their lives you were telling me you're a student do you feel like you can open a book and get back to your studies again life is frozen isn't it? it's exactly that life is frozen there are 29 people's families behind every single person of the 129 there's family and friends and relatives there are so many people whose lives have completely stopped each person is an entire world and life can't go on until they get back to us tell us about your friends about Zivengali what kind of guys are they? Zivengali are really really funny that's what everybody would say about them they have the kindest heart I always told Ziv that he has the biggest heart I've ever seen he's the nicest person that I know he always puts himself before others they both do they take care of their disabled father they're very very loving towards their family and their nephews and they love playing soccer they love watching soccer they love traveling together they do everything together they work together as well but there is so much similarity in between them especially about their hobbies they like to hang out together and they have a lot of mutual friends and they work together and just in general for me it's really heartbreaking to think of how such good people like how does this happen to someone that good how does it happen to anyone and that they shouldn't be there and that it's life did they grow up in the akibots? wow and kvaraza of course was one of the worst hit yeah specifically their neighborhood the neighborhood of the young people was one who was struck really really hard and it would mean so much to of course the families but also the communities to have those boys back couldn't it? of course yellow bouquet of flowers I can't think of a nicer gesture a nicer symbol so if you want to show your support for the 129 hostages still being held in gaza and of course we are talking about a potential ceasefire just reports but it would be up to 40 hostages and we know that the priority would be elderly people women it's horrible but they would be quite far down the list wouldn't they? they would but at least there would be a list at least some people will get back to us and that's a start alright we'll know that you'll be reunited with your friends we're hoping and praying for that as we are for all the hostages thank you very much and again if you want to show your support for the 129 hostages still being held by terrorists in gaza you can take part in this initiative remind me of the name of the Zertikva it's Hope we're going to take a very short break here on 921 do stay with us after this don't go away her king's famous 1968 mountaintop speech was based on his trip to the promised land well now 55 years later his prophetic words are coming true hundreds of african-american women took a journey of a lifetime to the holy land we'll introduce you to the amazing female spiritual religious leaders who are infusing new energy into the next generation of african-americans news 24 Israel under attack news 24 in spanish brings analysis and information about the events of the war exclusive interviews and reports from the war zone the reaction of the spanish-speaking countries news 24 the only medium in spanish that keeps you informed and connected with the latin community in israel news 24 only on i24news into the unbelievable tale of the broadage family afighi was fighting off terrorists on october 7 only to find out that his wife agar under three children been kidnapped into gaza along with their neighbor's daughter four-year-old afighi elidan her parents were murdered after 51 days of hamas captivity they were all reunited now for the first time there they're talking about how they survived how they managed to remain sane how the kids learned to cry silently and how afighi el became a family member in an instant a very powerful piece you have to watch take a look you look at them like that do you still see the science remains of gaza of october 7 news 24 yes yes news 24 it was a war of survival news 24 it was always thinking about when will be the next time your children get food when the sun will rise there will be some light in the room and you won't be in complete darkness everyday you think you've reached the bottom of hell there's no getting lower but one day after another you find out there's another step and you take one more step down to hell and you carry your children together with you on your back 51 days they were in hell agar with her three children ten-year-old ofri eight-year-old you've all four-year-old oria and the one who in captivity became agar's fourth daughter avigal idan also only four years old for 51 days at the high their father fought for the family that was kidnapped from their home while he was out fighting with the kibbutz security squad in the morning when it all started i called me to come and lock the door after him he looked through the door's people to see that there was no terrorists or anything like that i saw that he noticed something he saw avigai through the people when he stepped out she just ran away he ran after her and shouted guli guli stop she didn't stop so he had to grab her and bring her over to me i immediately locked the door after him she was covered in blood not hers but her parents i hugged her, wrapped her tried to clean her up she said her older brother said that the mom and dad were dead and that she had to run away and so she did i didn't realize the magnitude of the events until the moment the terrorists entered our home four hours later and what happened when they entered i asked the children to cover themselves with blankets they covered themselves i turned off and i hid there's a space between the door of the safe room and the closet i hid there and held the door as much as i could i'm not particularly strong in the end they managed to get in there were at least 15 terrorists inside the house and when they came in and turned on the light in the safe room i started screaming they're just kids don't do anything to them and then the children took off their blankets and started crying and screaming they took us in my car the five of us with three other terrorists two sitting in the front one sitting in the back the way we entered Gaza it was one big show for them they hung the horn of the car opened the car doors hit me, pulled my hair and oh free the terrorists kept grabbing her by the shirt to show everyone what a price he had grabbed it was scary scary this is a moment when you lose control you lose the protection everything you've created for your children those minutes are the minutes that broke everything just moments of horror when you were in Gaza what did you think happened to everyone I don't know sometimes I thought I wouldn't see you again sometimes I thought I wouldn't see Rodney anymore I'll tell you what I was thinking in the car I thought they were going to kill us in the car really? yes, because they had guns it was stressful we were told to be quiet I thought they were going to kill us all in the car instead of at home what did you think after so much time had passed and you still stayed there you'll never return and that we'll have to live in Gaza that's really what I thought how do you survive there? so it turns out that the body and mind are able to create so many mechanisms of survival that you don't feel anything you don't get sick your mind is empty you're not hungry you don't smell you just survive for these four little children you're not crying how can I cry I have four little children that I have to look after that I have to protect in this hell how did you spend your day there what did it look like so in the first house we were in we had two notebooks and unsharpened pencils and we messed around with that trying to sharpen them and draw or play we played a lot of country, city me and the big ones and the time passed slowly the days never ended in the second house we were in I asked them if they had playing cards so they brought me cards and also some sort of imitation of Taki and we would spend most of the day playing card games lots of talking lots and lots of talking and whispers because it was forbidden it was forbidden to speak loudly they didn't want the neighbors to hear us there might be a snitch who would report that there was Israelis in the house it was forbidden to cry and it was forbidden to laugh and it was forbidden to shout obviously I asked them how do you deal with not being allowed to cry wow a free learn to cry quietly UV it was hard for him to learn to cry quietly but he eventually succeeded in the little ones it was hard you can't teach a four-year-old kid to cry quietly we celebrated Ohri's 10th birthday there and overnight she turned 20 she was my partner she was the angel that watched over me in this whole story and UV who was my sensitive boy who always needed me the most was suddenly a man he suddenly saw that I had not one for your child to take care of but two of them and he knew how to help me with that and with Uriah and Abigai it was difficult it was very difficult Uriah is my baby and now I had another little girl who went through hell when you eat you eat a little so that you can leave more and you know because you have no other choice they're hungry there was great hunger they were starving when I begged for food they told me our children eat only pita a day as well so your children will only eat a pita a day for 24 hours this is what each one of us could eat I don't wish any mother wherever she is to be in a situation where she begs for food to give her children I don't wish that to be in a situation where she begs for food to give her children a little bit the same as that of Abigai that day was Abigai's birthday November 24th and she kept saying I'm still three years old I'll celebrate my 4th birthday when I return home we drove in the Red Cross's car and when we arrived I met Hen Goldstein and her children and Hen when she saw me in the car Abigai is waiting for you I heard it on the radio the abdukti who was with me at the beginning was with her at the end and she had told her about us that's when I found out Abigai was alive all the barriers came down and the tears started falling and the truth is that what awaited us in Israel it was something that I really did not expect for 51 days in captivity I was sure they forgot about us it was simply unbelievable everyone coming together from citizens who do not know me at all to the doctors in Schneider Medical Center people who really gave to us from the bottom of their hearts I can't believe four weeks have already passed I've been here four weeks and they haven't there are 129 hostages with a astronomical number who are not here in the end we're lucky we got our family back it will be a long process but they will be fine we will work on it we will do everything so that the joy will return that the security will return to them there's no other choice what my child Western militaries have been shifting the lessons we'll be learning from Ukraine and also from the war that Israel has with its borders let's get to Robert Swift with this report the Israel gas offence was protected by some of the best border security technology in the world remote gun turrets, underground sensors to detect tunneling and surveillance balloons the after barrier was built on the assumption that we have a very high technology signal vision that we will tell us when someone is approaching the fence this one collapsed Hamas simply went through it with demolition charges and pickup trucks overwhelming the defences with force of numbers and a few drones believing that its high tech defences suffice Israel let other more basic considerations fall by the wayside Israel adopted I think 20 years asymmetric balance between technology and the number of units manpower that it needs on the field it looks like Israel thought in its calculation that the high technology will bring advantage to the battlefield instead of represent of manpower inside it since the October 7th attack a number of former Israeli generals have argued for an expanded IDF budget and footprint Ukraine fighting on a very different battlefield also sees its manning levels as a problem unfortunately manpower is still super important because we get back to the scales of massive armies of million strong armies which is absolutely weird which is absolutely unnatural to the state of our modern society locked in a stalemate with a larger foe its chief of staff argues that advances in technologies like electronic warfare are needed to break the deadlock in the 21st century the development of science and as a result the advancement of armaments and military equipment inevitably led to the changes in the tactics of its use the enemy didn't stay behind either you see what is happening specifically in the last few days we have a powerful confrontation specifically in the technological aspect both of the wars defining 2023 show a blurring of low and high technologies on the battlefield in Ukraine the first large example of state on state drone warfare the howitzer, the shovel and the trench as seen on the fields of the first world war are as important as the quadcopter and in Gaza urban siege warfare reminiscent of Stalingrad is being waged by the Middle East's most technologically advanced military but low and high tech solutions should not be viewed as opposites in conflict but as complimentary Israel will continue to be a country that relies very much on technology but you have to understand that there are areas and places that you cannot rely only solely on technology you have to go sometimes back to human beings and sometimes to technologies that are not always the cutting edge the infantry soldier on the ground present in war for millennia can become a high tech tool when equipped with the latest weapons, sensors and communications devices even a badly equipped insurgent can become part of the developing information war space when kitted out with a GoPro and an internet connection Kiev has repeatedly demonstrated the significance of this front in modern war Ukraine and Gaza's battles have shown that often a low tech solution can be the best counter to a high tech innovation we have a pretty weird situation in which simple but smart and cheap solutions really change things on the battlefield as can be seen in the use of trenches or cage armor to protect from the prying eyes and drop munitions of drones both wars have also shown that quantity has a quality all of its own and that high tech doesn't need to mean expensive whether that means in terms of expendable munitions or massed infantry a lesson that western militaries many of which have downsized in recent decades may wish to heed as the threat of state on state warfare grows western militaries will take heed to the developing technological shifts on the battlefields of Ukraine and Israel or sooner or later learn the hard way it's not true that the era of wars is over unfortunately that's not true no peace is guaranteed absolutely not peace is guaranteed and moreover there is an illusion that western nations can have small armies well armed armies of motivated professionals who want to do that unfortunately that may not be true because the epoch of universal peace that we hope for in the west in here it seems to be over 629 October 7 it was the dawn of the day that never ended the nova rave held adjacent to the gaza strip was suddenly stopped by a different music the sound of sirens the mass attack from land and air perpetrating the deadliest terror attack in israeli history murdering 364 civilians at the rave alone and kidnapping 40 others we were quite close to the borders unfortunately and this community that has around 10,000 members was the biggest community that was hit of all the victims the murdered victims from the 7th of October almost 400 people and the number is still rising there are still hostages now we saw that Hamas is keep murdering people in captivity and some of them are dancers in the party and this is how my life has been going on for the last 3 months notifying the death of my friend finding out new informations about how they died at the expo Tel Aviv the reminders of a fateful day straw mats tents, hammocks all retrieved from the place of the massacre the nova 6.9 exhibit takes you back to that morning October 7 so you can feel even if a little bit as if you were there this large expo center becomes a memento to the victims of the massacre all the objects you can see here they were retrieved as they were left in Kibbutz Reim portable toilets riddled with bullets cars burned down this is the result of Hamas killing spree this exhibition was made because Kibbutz Reiri and Kibbutz Neroz the villages around Gaza they have something to show they can show the world this is what was done for us and we had nothing our parties are being built and reassembled in around 5 hours so we decided we're going to rebuild it here and we're going to add to it the burnt cars of our friends even one of the burnt cars here is the one I rode to to this party and the bathroom cells with the shooting guns everything we could have shown to the world because we have to explain it we were in such a big high for this party we were in such a good place at 628 and at 629 my whole world collapsed the earth was just blanked around my feet and everyone else in this party 3,500 people were there 15% were murdered and this exhibition is there to show what happened to us and to show who is the noble community and what we stand for the lost and found area clothes, clothes, bags and other items from the thousands of participants of the rave who had to live all behind in the hope of surviving the massacre an image that alludes to the millions of personal items left by the Jews during the Holocaust an image that impacts all visitors for me it's really emotional to be here my best friend was murdered in the party, he had a painting store so we painted all the night and many people came to see his painting in the end he tried to get out and escape and him and the other best friend they were murdered in the car I think this this presentation is amazing it's really make people feel what they felt and to feel what they been going through in this terrible, terrible time when the attack appeared so it's like a small taste of what happened the hostages square Tel Aviv it's become a focal point in the campaign to raise awareness of the Israelis abducted Tugasa and keep the plight in the public eye one of the items here is quite unique a solitary piano with a slogan on it alone, you are not alone I felt that I need to do something that will make people maybe understand about him more and learn about him more and by playing they will be in contact with him the piano is dedicated to Alon Oil, 22-year-old who was kidnapped to Gaza from the Nova Festival on October 7 Alon is a talented musician planned to study music at the prestigious Rimon Academy in Ramata Sharon, north of Tel Aviv but October 7 changed everything on that night Friday night we had dinner with our family we came home, he got ready played the piano left the piano open and his brother took him to a friend's house and then from there they drove to the Nova Festival they got there about 5 in the morning so he was like there for maybe an hour, an hour and a half and it's all started it started with rockets falling down knowing that they have to get cover from the rockets they got into a car into their car and started to drive north but the police stopped them and told them that they can go forward so they went south and found a shelter a bomb shelter near Reim at that time the Hamas came in and started to throw grenades into the bomb shelter at that time the Hamas came inside and took my son and three others the piano has become one of the most iconic items in this sad square as people occasionally stop some of the players are famous Israeli musicians such as singers Rami Kleinstein and Marina Maximilian for me it was important to say alone you're not alone because it's very important to think of him not being alone and the fact is that we are not alone and the fact that we are thinking about him makes him and us not being alone so it's like a whole you know thing that has to do with that ever since October 7 has been traveling the world as part of advocacy campaign to promote the message bring them home now I can say now after all that this time it's been 81 days now today then when I'll see him the first thing I'll tell him that I know him better now because of the beautiful things that his friends are telling me about him and everything that people writing me things and sending me things about him not being able to know before because as a mother you don't know everything your son is doing and now I know and it's beautiful and I want to meet him how he is now and I'll give him a big hug after two months of intense fighting in Gaza IDF paratroopers are being treated to a well-deserved spa day with a small Israeli-owned company the owner of the outfit Alec Shamesh and manager Tal El Nazarian decided to use their expertise to turn a bus into a barbershop to help soldiers serving in the war these additions help the bus look and feel like the real thing my soldiers, I have nephews in the soldiers, it's my people it's us, this is our country and we will do what we can do to help our soldiers to be and win this war you can't mess with William Manino a hairdresser who's come all the way from Natania because he just loves to cut hair and wants to help the paratroopers in any way he can I'm volunteering we are very happy to do so I'm giving my own time to the cause I came here this morning on my day off and this is what I'm doing cutting the hair of the soldiers I also saw chefs cooking for some soldiers it's a treat for these soldiers who've been fighting since October 7th without a break they haven't even had the chance to take off their boots for weeks this is a weird feeling seeing all of this support have baited the transition from fighting in the war to here, really smooth everyone is helping depending on their skill set and it's a very pleasant feeling for us the IDF is spending a lot of time and effort to ensure an easy transition for us once again, as Israel fights on civilian volunteers find ways to help the fighters taking the pressure off the soldiers for a few days before they go back into battle Israel is in a state of war families completely done down in their beds we have no idea where is she as our soldiers are fighting on the front line but the general perception is something that certainly needs to be fought as well